The Daily Heller: If Trump Doodled With AI, What Would He Doo?

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Hat tip, Ann Telnaes, about another article there, but once I was in the rabbit hole ...

Ann Telnaes
‪@anntelnaes.bsky.social‬

Read Steven Heller--->

https://www.printmag.com/daily-heller/foro-italico-nee-foro-mussolini/

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9:22 AM · Mar 20, 2026

Read Steven Heller--->

www.printmag.com/daily-heller...

— Ann Telnaes (@anntelnaes.bsky.social) 2026-03-20T13:22:31.860Z

The Daily Heller: If Trump Doodled With AI, What Would He Doo?

Posted inThe Daily Heller

By Steven Heller
Posted 1 day ago ∙ 3 min. read

Given that the president is so fond of architecture, he is fortunate to reign in this AI Era. While AI must never be allowed to encroach on humanity’s creative or critical space, thinking about the prompts Trump might make on ChatGPT is a fine way to pass a few idle moments (and use up my allotment of free prompt-o-tunities).

1. Build a building that represents ostentatious neoclassical grandeur as large as it can be …



2. . Nope. Something grander. Build a building that is gaudy, ostentatious and covered in neoclassical grandeur as tall as it can be, as if it were conceived by Raymond Massey in the movie version of Ayn Rand’s Fountainhead.



3. This time, give me a closeup of its details, with a balcony for an autocrat.



4. Drape the balcony for an autocrat with red-and-blue banners with the letter ‘T’ on them. And give the leader a gold scepter.



{and so on}

Steven Heller
Steven Heller has written for PRINT since the 1980s. He is co-chair of SVA MFA Designer as Entrepreneur. The author, co-author and editor of over 200 books on design and popular culture, Heller is also the recipient of the Smithsonian Institution National Design Award for "Design Mind," the AIGA Medal for Lifetime Achievement and other honors. He was a senior art director at The New York Times for 33 years and a writer of obituaries and book review columnist for the newspaper, as well. His memoir, Growing Up Underground (Princeton Architectural Press) was published in 2022. Some of his recent essays are collected in For the Love of Design (Allworth Press).

[highplainsdem]

1. Well, let's hope this AI slop isn't shown to Trump to give him any ideas.