According to govt contracts reviewed by ABC News, additional than $200,000 has been spent for enhanced White House janitorial and housekeeping do the job, including $127,249 on “2021 Inaugural Cleansing” and another $44,038 on “Inaugural carpet cleaning.” There was $29,523 expended for “Inaugural curtains cleansing.”
Although the White Household is constantly deep-cleaned through the changeover in between presidents, that work is usually taken care of by White Dwelling staff, including butlers, ushers and routine maintenance crews. Contracting out added cleansing expert services is unparalleled in modern-day periods, according to Kate Brower Andersen, presidential historian and former White Dwelling reporter.
“We’ve never ever found this prior to,” Brower Andersen said on ABC News’ “Powerhouse Politics” podcast. “The Authorities Products and services Administration has stated they are likely to do this pretty deep cleaning — cleaning each and every area of the 55,000 sq. foot mansion. You can find always been a deep thoroughly clean concerning administrations, but we’ve under no circumstances witnessed something like this.”
In a statement, a GSA spokesperson explained, “GSA will carefully cleanse and disinfect the setting up areas in between the administrations and be certain that anything is up to conventional. Cleansing will incorporate, but is not confined to, all home furnishings, flooring, window therapies, handrails, doorway knobs, light switches, counter tops, elevator buttons, restroom fixtures and dispensers, doorway handles and force plates, and lighting fixtures.”
The deep cleansing will come just after multiple substantial in-human being occasions at the White Household about the past couple of months, in the course of which attendees hardly ever wore masks or practiced social distancing. Adhering to those people functions, dozens of Trump administration staffers and allies tested favourable for COVID-19, including the president, the to start with girl and the main of staff members.
The cleaning contracts ended up awarded the Didlake, a Manassas, Virginia-primarily based corporation whose mission is to offer work prospects for men and women with disabilities.
In addition to the deep cleansing, a govt agreement offers $115,000 to substitute and put in new carpeting “to right the latest flooring situation” for many workplaces inside of the West Wing, East Wing and the Eisenhower Executive Office environment Building (EEOB).
Didlake did provide carpet cleansing products and services in the EEOB prior to President Donald Trump’s inauguration. A Jan. 6, 2017 deal allocated $42,000 for that get the job done. But there have been no contracts for expanded cleansing expert services at the time.
The raging COVID-19 pandemic could prove to be a problem when it will come to the remarkable operate of transitioning the White Household in between presidential citizens. Historically, the 132-room mansion is reworked all through a 5- to 6-hour period of time when the outgoing and incoming presidents are occupied with inaugural ceremonies on Capitol Hill. At that time, “a very perfectly-organized ballet choreography” involving dozens of home team unfolds, according to previous White House usher Gary Walters.
But Biden’s group has practiced rigorous COVID-19 basic safety protocols, such as limiting the selection of men and women in enclosed spaces about the president-elect. It is unclear no matter if the administration will get techniques to limit the amount of staffers associated with the move, but a person Biden transition official reported the president-elect intends to move into the White Household on a regular timeline. A transition spokesperson did not reply to ask for for comment on the want for expanded cleansing.
Biden has now acquired each doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, as has shortly-to-be initial lady Jill Biden.
Incoming press secretary Jen Psaki has verified that some White Property workers will start doing the job for the new administration remotely.
“We would not have all staff in the White Dwelling simply because our mantra is COVID protection 1st for everyone,” Psaki explained Wednesday. “We’re waiting on details of how lots of individuals will be there on the initial day and initially months.”
ABC News’s Karen Travers and Molly Nagle contributed to this report.
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