{"id":2866,"date":"2026-06-05T18:06:38","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T18:06:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movinginsiderusa.com\/?p=2866"},"modified":"2026-06-05T18:06:38","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T18:06:38","slug":"courts-cant-stop-trumps-white-house-ballroom-justice-department-argues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movinginsiderusa.com\/?p=2866","title":{"rendered":"Courts can\u2019t stop Trump\u2019s White House ballroom, Justice Department argues"},"content":{"rendered":"

Only Congress can intervene, an administration lawyer said, as an appeals panel weighs whether to halt the project.<\/strong><\/p>

Read more NCAA hands North Dakota 1-year probation for tampering violations by assistant coach Travis Stepps<\/a><\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n
Work continues on the ballroom and a UFC cage at the White House last month. (Jose Luis Magana\/AP)<\/figcaption>\n<\/figure>\n

The Justice Department on Friday argued that the court system cannot stop President Donald Trump\u2019s White House ballroom project, urging an appeals court to overturn a lower-court order halting construction.<\/p>\n

Yaakov Roth, a Justice Department lawyer, told a three-judge panel at the U.S. Court of Appeals for D.C. that only Congress could decide the fate of Trump\u2019s ballroom \u2014 and argued that lawmakers already had authorized the project by setting aside several million dollars for annual White House \u201cimprovements.\u201d Roth also said that the project was \u201cwell along\u201d in construction and that stopping it now would pose national security risks.<\/p>\n

Judge Patricia Ann Millett, an appointee of President Barack Obama, was openly skeptical of Roth\u2019s arguments, interrupting him repeatedly as he argued that Trump\u2019s plan to build an expansive, 90,000-square-foot ballroom did not represent a harmful change to the White House grounds. She also pressed him on his claim that historical preservationists had waited too long to sue.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo your position is this can\u2019t be stopped by a court?\u201d Millett said, asking whether it would have been appropriate for courts to intervene after Trump demolished the East Wing last year. \u201cWhen did it become a fait accompli?\u201d<\/p>\n

It would have been improper for the courts \u201ceven on Day 1,\u201d Roth said.<\/p>\n

Tad Heuer, a Foley Hoag attorney representing the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which brought the case, told the panel that they had the authority to halt the ballroom project. He cited Marbury v. Madison<\/i>, a landmark Supreme Court ruling that established courts\u2019 power to serve as a check on other branches of government.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government\u2019s position apparently is that even a lawless action of this type can never be stopped by the court,\u201d Heuer said.<\/p>\n

The appeals judges \u2014 Bradley Garcia, an appointee of President Joe Biden; Neomi Rao, a Trump appointee; and Millett \u2014 will weigh the case and issue a written opinion.<\/p>\n

Arguments on Friday largely centered on whether the National Trust for Historic Preservation has standing to bring its case, and whether Trump has authority to build the project and solicit private donations for it without express authorization from Congress.<\/p>\n

A contingent of about a dozen government lawyers, including Stanley Woodward Jr., the Justice Department\u2019s third-highest-ranking official, attended the hearing in a sign of the president\u2019s investment in the case.<\/p>

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U.S. District Judge Richard Leon in March ordered the White House to stop building the ballroom, ruling that Trump needs congressional approval to fund the project, but work proceeded for the past month and a half after a federal appeals court stayed the ruling.<\/p>\n

In ordering a halt to construction, Leon objected to the administration\u2019s plan to pay for the project with private donations and a modest White House maintenance fund, calling it a \u201cRube Goldberg\u201d contraption designed to evade congressional oversight.<\/p>\n

Trump has raged about Leon\u2019s ruling<\/a> <\/b>on social media and in public remarks, insisting that his facility must be built so presidents can safely entertain VIP guests.<\/p>\n

Congress had shown little appetite to authorize the project, which polls have consistently shown most Americans oppose. Fifty-six percent of Americans disapprove of Trump\u2019s decision to tear down the White House\u2019s East Wing to make way for the building, while 28 percent support it, according to a <\/b>Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll conducted in April, the same division another poll found in six months earlier.<\/p>\n

Trump says the private funding is designed to protect taxpayers, and lawyers for the administration have consistently argued that continuing construction is a matter of national security. Any pause in work would endanger Trump, his family and White House staff, they say, with the planned building designed to defend against \u201chostile attacks via drones, ballistic missiles, bullets, biohazards\u201d and other potential threats.<\/p>\n

The politics of the project have proved complex for Trump.<\/p>\n

A shooting at the White House correspondents\u2019 dinner in April rallied some Republicans to his cause<\/a>. Senate Republicans in the days after the incident proposed folding $1 billion in White House security funding into an immigration enforcement bill \u2014 though they insisted the money was for security measures, not the ballroom itself. The White House initially said the legislation would authorize the whole project but then backtracked.<\/p>\n

The effort collapsed. The Senate parliamentarian ruled the provision could not be included in the reconciliation bill, and some Republicans privately said there weren\u2019t enough votes to advance it regardless. Trump responded by calling for the firing of the parliamentarian, who nevertheless remains employed.<\/p>\n

Justice Department lawyers seized on the shooting to press Leon to dissolve his order, mocking the National Trust as suffering from \u201cTrump Derangement Syndrome\u201d in a brief that resembled Trump\u2019s social media posts.<\/p>\n

Construction has pressed forward. What began as underground work \u2014 Trump has said the facility extends six stories belowground, with planned military and medical facilities \u2014 has since risen where the East Wing once stood. Workers have started building the first floor of the structure, which is designed to include a commercial kitchen and offices for the first lady, with rebar columns visible from outside the fenced-off site. Trump gave selected journalists a 45-minute tour of the site last month, saying the building\u2019s facade would be better than the Supreme Court\u2019s.<\/p>

Read more Zverev beats Mensik in French Open semifinals and within a win of elusive Grand Slam title<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Only Congress can intervene, an administration lawyer said, as an appeals panel weighs whether to halt the project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2864,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting"],"yoast_head":"\nCourts can\u2019t stop Trump\u2019s White House ballroom, Justice Department argues - Moving Insider USA<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/movinginsiderusa.com\/?p=2866\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Courts can\u2019t stop Trump\u2019s White House ballroom, Justice Department argues - 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