President Donald Trump’s latest visit to the United Nations General Assembly in New York City was supposed to be a showcase of American leadership on the world stage. Instead, it spiraled into a dramatic episode that has sparked accusations, official denials, and investigations—what Trump himself has dubbed “triple sabotage.”
On September 24, 2025, as Trump and First Lady Melania Trump arrived at the 80th session of the UN General Assembly, their entrance was marked by an unexpected jolt: the escalator they were riding suddenly came to a halt. According to Trump’s own account, posted the following day on Truth Social, the stoppage was not just a minor inconvenience. “It’s amazing that Melania and I didn’t fall forward onto the sharp edges of these steel steps, face first,” he wrote. “It was only that we were each holding the handrail tightly or, it would have been a disaster. This was absolutely sabotage, as noted by a day’s earlier ‘post’ in The London Times that said UN workers ‘joked about turning off an escalator.’ The people that did it should be arrested!”
Trump’s frustration didn’t end there. As he prepared to address world leaders from the Main Speaking Floor, he encountered a second technical failure: his teleprompter was unresponsive for the first 15 minutes of his speech. “I immediately thought to myself, ‘Wow, first the escalator event, and now a bad teleprompter. What kind of a place is this?’” Trump posted. “I then proceeded to make a Speech without a teleprompter, which kicked in about 15 minutes later. The good news is the Speech has gotten fantastic reviews. Maybe they appreciated the fact that very few people could have done what I did.”
But the list of grievances grew even longer. According to Trump, the auditorium’s sound system failed during his address, leaving world leaders unable to hear him unless they used interpreters’ earpieces. “I was told that the sound was completely off in the Auditorium where the Speech was made, that World Leaders, unless they used the interpreters’ earpieces, couldn’t hear a thing,” he explained. “The first person I saw at the conclusion of the Speech was Melania, who was sitting right up front. I said, ‘How did I do?’ And she said, ‘I couldn’t hear a word you said.’”
By the morning of September 25, 2025, Trump had escalated his complaints into a full-blown demand for accountability. “This wasn’t a coincidence; this was triple sabotage at the UN. They ought to be ashamed of themselves. I’m sending a copy of this letter to the Secretary General, and I demand an immediate investigation. No wonder the United Nations hasn’t been able to do the job that they were put in existence to do. All security tapes at the escalator should be saved, especially the emergency stop button. The Secret Service is involved.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt echoed Trump’s concerns in an appearance on Fox News, stating, “That’s definitely what it appears to be to me. There was some concerning reporting over the weekend that UN globalist staffers were basically plotting to set up the president of the United States. First it was the escalator, then it was the teleprompter.” Leavitt also referenced conservative commentator Katie Pavlich, who claimed that the audio inside the room was “much lower and different” for Trump compared to the previous speaker. “When you put all of this together, it doesn’t look like a coincidence to me. We have people, including the United States Secret Service, looking into this to get to the bottom of it. If we find that these were UN staffers who were purposefully trying to trip up – literally trip up – the president and the first lady of the United States. Well, there better be accountability for those people, and I will personally see to it.”
The United Nations, for its part, moved quickly to address the allegations. Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, issued a statement clarifying the cause of the escalator malfunction. “The safety mechanism is designed to prevent people or objects accidentally being caught and stuck in or pulled into the gearing,” Dujarric explained. “The videographer may have inadvertently triggered the safety function.” A subsequent investigation, including a readout of the machine’s central processing unit, confirmed that the escalator had stopped after a built-in safety mechanism on the comb step was triggered at the top of the escalator. According to ABC News, the U.N. emphasized that the safety feature was working as intended and was not a deliberate act.
As for the teleprompter, the United Nations pointed out that it has no involvement in operating the device for the U.S. president. “We have no comment since the teleprompter for the U.S. president is operated by the White House,” a U.N. spokesman told ABC News. This clarification, however, did little to quell suspicions among Trump’s supporters, who have continued to question the timing and sequence of the mishaps.
Trump’s call for an investigation also extended to the preservation of security footage. He insisted that “all security tapes at the escalator should be saved, especially the emergency stop button.” The Secret Service, according to Trump and White House officials, is reviewing the escalator, teleprompter, and audio issues for possible sabotage.
While the White House and Trump loyalists frame the incidents as a coordinated attempt to undermine the president, critics and late-night comedians have been quick to lampoon the controversy. As reported by The Independent, Stephen Colbert donned a deerstalker hat and Meerschaum pipe in a Sherlock Holmes parody, poking fun at what he called “Escalator-gate” and the conspiracy theories swirling around it.
Behind the spectacle, the episode highlights the deep mistrust and political polarization that now define interactions between the Trump administration and international institutions like the United Nations. Trump’s address to the Assembly was itself a lightning rod, with the president telling world leaders that the U.K. and Europe “are going to hell,” dismissing climate change as a “green scam,” and accusing the body of “funding an assault on Western countries and their borders” by encouraging mass migration. Yet, even as his speech made headlines for its content, the technical glitches and Trump’s reaction to them quickly overshadowed the diplomatic agenda.
For the United Nations, the incident is a test of its ability to maintain neutrality and ensure the safety and dignity of all visiting heads of state, regardless of political controversy. For Trump and his supporters, it is another chapter in a narrative of perceived hostility from global institutions—a narrative that has fueled his political brand for years.
With the Secret Service and possibly other agencies now looking into the events, and with Trump’s demand for accountability hanging in the air, the world watches to see whether this “triple sabotage” claim will fade as a footnote or become yet another flashpoint in the ongoing saga of U.S.-UN relations.
