Video shows bag being thrown out of White House window?

Over the 2025 Labor Day weekend, a video shared online purportedly showing a bag being thrown out of a window of the White House. The footage spread as rumors swelled that U.S. President Donald Trump was ill or dead, with some social media users suggesting that White House staff were discarding things as a result of Trump no longer being able to preside over the country.

For example, one Instagram user who shared (archived) the clip claimed that it was peculiar for a window of the building to be open as the panes should be sealed as a consequence of the 9/11 attacks. The caption read:

Why is stuff getting tossed out the White House window?? After 9/11 they sealed every window with bulletproof glass — you can’t just crack one open. The whole pane has to come out.

And contractors aren’t even allowed in the residence if the President’s inside… sooo if work’s being done. Trump wasn’t there last night.

This ain’t adding up.

The video and claim also appeared on Instagram’s partner app Threads and on Facebook, YouTube and X.

A spokesperson for the White House confirmed via email that the clip was authentic and explained what it showed: “It was a contractor who was doing regular maintenance while the President was gone.” Snopes asked them to confirm the day when this occurred. We will update this report if they respond.

However, using Google Maps and Google Earth, it was possible to narrow down the location from which the footage was recorded.

Given that it showed the eastern facade of the White House at a downward angle, it could not have been shot from the U.S. Treasury building, which sits right next to the presidential residence and is roughly the same height. Instead, it appeared to have been filmed from the roof of the Hotel Washington building to the east of the Treasury. The cutlery noises and electronic music playing in the background appeared to corroborate this as the roof of Hotel Washington is home to VUE Rooftop, a restaurant and bar. One publicly available 360-degree photo on Google Maps, taken at VUE Rooftop, showed the eastern facade of the White House from a similar viewpoint to that in the Instagram video.

The sunlight on the White House indicated that it was roughly late morning — close to noon — when the footage was recorded. The restaurant’s website said that it is open from 11 a.m. to 1 a.m. on Saturdays, 11 a.m. to 12 a.m. on Sundays and 4 p.m. to 12 a.m. on Mondays. Given the timing of when the video began circulating online, it appeared that a patron recorded it from their table on Sunday, Aug. 31, when Trump was reportedly playing golf at his Virginia golf club, according to CNN.

The bag appeared to be dropped from a window on the same floor that the Yellow Oval Room is located. According to various floor plans of the White House, it was thrown from inside or next to a sitting room adjacent to the Lincoln Bedroom, known as the Lincoln Sitting Room.