NBC News senior White House correspondent Gabe Gutierrez confronted President Donald Trump’s over opposition to his $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” asking if he’s “losing control” of the Senate GOP.

The Trump Justice Department announced the creation of a so-called “Anti-Weaponization Fund” on Monday as part of the settlement in Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS over the leaking of his tax returns by a former official.

The move is widely seen as an unaccountable “slush fund” that could be used to funnel cash to the president’s allies, and has gotten pushback from several prominent Republicans.

When Gutierrez confronted Trump during an Oval Office event on Thursday, the president focused on funding for his ballroom:

NBC NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT GABE GUTIERREZ: Mr. President, with many Americans concerned about affordability ahead of the midterms, there is some backlash from Senate Republicans to some of the other priorities, the ballroom and that anti-weaponization fund.

You clearly still have a stronghold in the Republican Party. Your candidates did very well this week during the primaries. But are you losing control of the Senate?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: My candidates did well. Not all candidates did.

NBC NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT GABE GUTIERREZ: But are you losing control the Senate, sir? Are you losing control of the Senate, the Senate Republican?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t know. I really don’t know. I can tell you, I only do what’s right.

I don’t need money for the ballroom. You know, I’m making a gift of the ball room. This is the biggest misreporting that I’ve ever seen. The ballroom is being built. It’ll cost — it was going to be $200 million. I’ve doubled the size of it because we need it.

And it’s being done in conjunction with the military and with the — very much in conjunction with military and Secret Service. We’re on time, on budget, it’s going beautifully. I have all the money I need.

We’re making a gift to the United States. They came along and they said we want to make it, the White House overall, more secure. And I understand that. Not for me, because I’ll be gone, you know? I’ll been gone and you’ll have somebody else in for hopefully hundreds of years.

But that’s what they’re doing it for. The ballroom is paid for. It’s a gift. I mean, I want to make it clear because… So many people said, I thought you were giving this away, and all of a sudden–.

The money that they’re spending is for security, having to do maybe around the ballroom and other parts of the house. But this is not for the ballroom.

The ballroom is being a tremendous amount of what’s being done with respect to the ballroom, is for national security, including, as an example, a drone port on top of–.

Which was top secret until litigation made it less than top secret. But we have a drone port.

We have we have also we have the glass that’s four inches thick. Bulletproof glass We have bulletproof walls. We have–.

You need a place like this.

But this is being made as a gift from me and other people that are great patriots It’s been a lot of money. We’re building what will be the finest ballroom anywhere in the world.

Uh, if they want to spend money on securing the White House I think would be very, very much a good expenditure, but the ballroom is being built.

NBC NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT GABE GUTIERREZ: But what if Congress doesn’t sign off on the security money, sir?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Then the White house won’t be a very secure place.

Watch above via Fox News.

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