Bunker Ballroom Blocked

BOOM

Philip Yabut via Shutterstock

Trump has given America so many gifts! An “American Flag Blue” reflecting pool so clear you could swim in it. A state fair packed with luminaries like Dean Cain to celebrate the nation’s semiquincentennial. A giant arch that would make Reich Minister Albert Speer blush. And soon, a beautiful bunker ballroom where the White House’s East Wing once stood. All funded by private donations, at no cost to the taxpayer!

Or he would bless us with these bounties, if evil activist judges would quit getting in his way.

Droning on and on

The latest setback came Friday, courtesy of Judges Patricia Millett and Brad Garcia, appointed to the DC Circuit by “Barack Hussein Obama” and “Sleepy Joe Biden.” Over the dissent of “Highly Respected Judge, Neomi Rao” [sic], the three-judge panel affirmed the district court’s order blocking above-grade construction of Trump’s 90,000-square-foot Mar-a-Lago replica.

Naturally, Trump spent the weekend posting AI slop of the ballroom’s roof captioned “Drone Port.”

Tanker trucks on the roof are confusing, but the law here is not. Congress has delegated limited powers to the President for the “care, maintenance, repair, alternation, refurnishing, improvement, air-conditioning, heating, and lighting (including electric power and fixtures) of the Executive Residence at the White House” pursuant to 3 U.S.C. § 105(d). That’s why no one’s suing Trump over the tacky gold shit he keeps stapling to the walls at the White House. But under 40 U.S.C. § 8106, “A building or structure shall not be erected on any reservation, park, or public grounds of the Federal Government in the District of Columbia without express authority of Congress.” A gigantic ballroom is obviously a “building or structure,” and Congress has not expressly authorized Trump and pals to build one in President’s Park.

This is likely why Trump was cagey about his plans, promising in July of 2025 that any “renovations” would “pay total respect” to the existing structure of the East Wing. Then in October, before anyone could rush into court to stop him, Trump knocked down the entire East Wing and dumped the rubble at East Potomac Golf Course — another target of his “beautification” rampage.

He repeatedly insists that “the desperately needed, and totally secure Ballroom... is a Gift from President Trump and Great Patriots of the United States of America. There will be no expense to the American Taxpayer.” In reality, he’s already grabbed $352 million in funds designated for the Secret Service — more than a tenth of the agency’s budget — to build his ballroom. The New York Times now puts the total cost at $600 million, with more than half of it coming from public money. (So much for the gift.)

Today blinis, tomorrow bunkers

In December 2025, the National Trust for Historic Preservation sued to block construction, arguing the project violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) because Trump never secured Congressional approval as required by § 8106. Initially, the Justice Department argued that the APA did not apply, since construction was being run by the Office of the Executive Residence (EXR), rather than the National Park Service (NPS).

EXR’s job is to oversee floral arrangements and canapés at the White House, not major construction. But unlike the National Park Service, EXR is not a federal agency, and so it cannot be held to answer under the APA. Clearly the administration hoped to evade judicial review by parking this illegal construction inside the White House, and at first it actually worked. On February 26, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon denied the Trust’s first motion for preliminary injunction, holding that EXR cannot be sued under the APA. But Judge Leon also laid out a very clear roadmap for the Trust to get what it wanted.

“Unfortunately for Plaintiff, its challenge fails because the White House office in question is not an ‘agency’ under the APA and because Plaintiff did not bring the ultra vires claim necessary to challenge the President's statutory authority to complete his construction project with private funds and without congressional approval!” he wrote. Hint, hint.

Five days later, the Trust amended its complaint to add an ultra vires claim, and on March 31, Judge Leon granted their renewed request for an injunction. “The President of the United States is the steward of the White House for future generations of First Families. He is not, however, the owner!” he wrote.

Judge Leon mocked the government’s fallback theory that building Trump’s ballroom was a permissible “renovation” authorized by 3 U.S.C. § 105(d), noting that such an interpretation would give the President functionally limitless power. “Under Defendants’ reading, virtually any change to the White House could be framed as an ‘alteration’ or ‘improvement,’” he scoffed. “Indeed, some might even view tearing down the White House and building a modern skyscraper in its place as an ‘improvement.’” Indeed!

The government immediately appealed the injunction. But then, in late April, a disturbed man breached the first layer of security at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in an attempt to assassinate the president. Not wanting to let a good crisis go to waste, the Trump administration howled that this incident demonstrated the desperate need for the ballroom, accusing the plaintiffs of trying to get the president killed. Never mind that, even it if were appropriate to hold the WHCD at the White House, the event would be far too large for Trump’s planned ballroom,

The DOJ filed a truly deranged motion for an indicative ruling, demanding that Judge Leon announce that he would tear up the injunction if the government hadn’t yanked it away from him by filing an appeal. The motion, which was signed by the newly-confirmed Attorney General Todd Blanche, as well as senior DOJ officials Stan Woodward and Trent McCotter, refers to the National Trust’s name as “FAKE,” accuses the Trust of “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” and repeats the false claim that the ballroom is “FREE OF CHARGE AS A GIFT TO THE COUNTRY.” The motion was so wildly inappropriate that former White House Counsel Gregory Craig, who represents the Trust, suggested Rule 11 sanctions might be in order.

On top of the intemperate language, the motion floated the brand new claim that the underground bunker and the ballroom were so “knitted, unified, and cohesive” that halting construction of one necessarily stopped the other. This is exactly the opposite of what the government told the court in January, when it swore that underground construction could proceed without locking in the above-grade architecture.

Unsurprisingly, Judge Leon declined to grant the government’s request.

Reductio ad absurdum

Because Trump has no authority to rebuild the White House without Congressional approval, the DOJ has leaned hard into to standing as a means to defeat this case. It sneers contemptuously that architectural historian Alison Hoagland, the individual plaintiff through whom the Trust claims aesthetic injury, is merely “a single person who walks her dog in the vicinity of the White House.”

In fact, aesthetic standing is a well-established doctrine that has been around for decades. And, as Judge Millett pointed out in her opinion affirming the injunction, this “cramped standing theory would deem no one injured by a decision to raze the Statue of Liberty, to obscure the names on the Vietnam War Memorial, or to install a political billboard atop Mount Rushmore.”

She agreed with Judge Leon that the “care, maintenance, repair, alteration, refurnishing, improvement, air-conditioning, heating, and lighting” referred to in § 105(d) refers to ordinary maintenance and upkeep, not demolishing an entire structure and building a new one in its place. And so, barring intervention by the Supreme Court, Judge Leon’s injunction will hold. The administration is free to continue work on the underground bunker and other measures it deems necessary to Trump’s personal security, but can’t erect his temple of tackiness.

Naturally Trump vented his spleen on social media.

“We are not tenants,” he whined, inventing an alternate history in which his predecessors routinely took a wrecking ball to the White House without Congressional approval.

But of course, the White House belongs to the American people, not the president, and Congress gets to decide what happens to it. Everyone currently living there, drone ports and all, is just renting.