By Abha Bhattarai The Washington Post Sarah Squire’s wedding wasn’t meant to be a political statement. But, she says, it probably seems like one now.

Back when Squire booked the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., for her January nuptials, Donald Trump was one of a dozen candidates clamoring for the Republican nomination. He was widely presumed to be a long shot for the nation’s highest office.

But by the time Squire and her husband wed in the property’s presidential ballroom on Jan. 14, Trump was six days away from being sworn in as president.

“That definitely wasn’t something we ever considered,” said Squire, 27, who works for a law firm in Nashville, Tenn.“We had no idea this would happen.”

The reasons Squire chose the historic property on Pennsylvania Avenue, she says, were simple: It was a historic building in downtown Washington that could easily accommodate her 300 invitees.

“And we heard that it was Ivanka behind the design — not her daddy,” added Squire’s mother, Elisabeth.

“She has great taste.”

While a handful of couples have already tied the knot at Trump’s hotel since it opened in September, wedding planners say many others are eschewing the property in favor of lesscontroversial venues.

Trump spent $212 million renovating the historic property, which he is renting from the General Services Administration.

A spokeswoman for the hotel did not respond to requests for comment.

“A lot of brides are saying ‘This is very political for my guests, so I think I’ll go elsewhere,’” said a local wedding planner who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the backlash following an October wedding she planned at the hotel.

“The fallout of this — people threatening my family, calling for boycotts of my company — has been worse than anything I could’ve imagined,” she added.

Even couples who have already gotten married at the hotel are treading carefully.

One couple asked that their names not be visible in wedding photos shared online.

Others have begun leaving the name “Trump” off invitations, referring to the property instead by its original name, “the Old Post Office Pavilion,” according to a local florist.

The reaction to the property “has been as split as the election was,” said Jennifer Stiebel, owner of Soco Events, who planned a New Year’s Eve wedding at the hotel. “Let’s put it this way: There are definitely some clients I would never recommend it to. But at the same time, when you walk into that lobby, it’s hard to deny that it is gorgeous.”

That refrain — gorgeous, beautiful, stunning — was a common one among the Tara Melvin isn’t con vinced. As the owner o Perfect Planning Events she oversees about 15 wed dings a year but has no intention of planning any a the Trump.

“Honestly, I don’t ask my clients what their politica views are, but I do know that integrity is importan to a lot of them,” she said adding that she was put of by some of Trump’s com ments about women and people of different ethnic and religious groups.

“I would never go agains a client’s wants or needs, she added, “but this is one property I won’t voluntarily be recommending.”