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"Dump Trump" At Madame Tussauds In Berlin

Source: Tristar Media / Getty

Donald Trump may no longer be in office but at Louis Tussaud’s Waxworks, in San Antonio, Texas, museumgoers are getting all their licks in on the former POTUS’s wax figure. In fact, things have gotten so terrible that the museum’s owners, Ripley Entertainment, decided to remove Trump’s wax statue without telling anyone and stashed it away.

Clay Stewart, regional manager for Ripley Entertainment, told the San Antonio Express-News that visitors were punching and clawing the statue, including Trump’s face. Eventually, the damage became too much, and it had to be removed completely from the public. “When it’s a highly political figure, attacks can be a problem,” he said.

According to Stewart, statues of commanders-in-chief have historically been a target for vandals. “We’ve always had trouble with the presidential section because no matter what president it was — [43rd President of the U.S. George] Bush, Obama or Trump — they’ve all had people beat them,” he claimed. “The ears were torn off Obama six times. And then Bush’s nose was punched in.”

Trump’s figure initially arrived in San Antonio in early 2017, and it started getting mangled by visitors. The figure ended up suffering damage to the point that it was moved to the museum lobby, where ticket attendants could keep an eye on it and hopefully deter anything further. Instead, attacks on the figure rose concurrently with Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign. Finally, the museum had enough and silently took the figure away this past July, hid it in storage, and only chose to confirm the figure’s removal a few days ago.

By contrast, Trump’s predecessor has not undergone such a fate. “[Obama’s wax statue] has not been beaten as much since he left office,” Stewart said.

However, despite the history of violence visited upon the figure, Ripley’s swiftly clarified that its removal was apolitical and simply a maintenance issue. Public relations manager Suzanne Smagala-Potts issued the following statement late yesterday evening: “Our wax figures will need repairing from time to time, ranging from Hollywood celebrities to political figures. Ripley’s only showcases the highest quality of exhibits and wax figures. When a wax figure has been damaged, we will remove the figure from public display and send it to our talented team of artists for repair.”

The museum is offering no timeline for when Trump’s figure will be repaired or even return to San Antonio. But if it does, then according to the regional manager, that will likely be only after the museum receives the wax figure of someone who actually beat Trump in real life: the current commander-in-chief, President Joe Biden.