{"id":8834,"date":"2026-08-07T19:11:29","date_gmt":"2026-08-07T19:11:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movinginsiderusa.com\/?p=8834"},"modified":"2026-08-07T19:11:29","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T19:11:29","slug":"trump-says-hell-bring-ballroom-fight-to-supreme-court-after-lower-court-halts-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movinginsiderusa.com\/?p=8834","title":{"rendered":"Trump says he\u2019ll bring ballroom fight to Supreme Court after lower court halts work"},"content":{"rendered":"

An appeals court ruled earlier Friday that construction must stop until Congress authorizes the project. The ballroom is among the president\u2019s top priorities for this term.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Read more Court deals setback to Trump\u2019s war on wind as Pentagon is ordered to review projects<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"
At right, seen this month, the former site of the White House’s East Wing, where President Donald Trump wants a ballroom built. (Peter W. Stevenson\/The Washington Post)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

President Donald Trump on Friday said that he would ask the Supreme Court to allow him to resume work on his planned White House ballroom, after an appeals court ruled he had exceeded his authority by building it using private donations and ordered a halt.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will be immediately appealing to the United States Supreme Court,\u201d Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, reiterating his argument<\/a> that the planned $400 million, privately funded addition is needed to protect him and future presidents. \u201cThis unjust decision must be overturned by the Supreme Court in its entirety.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a 2-1 decision earlier Friday, a three-judge panel at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit sided with a federal judge\u2019s April ruling<\/a> requiring construction to <\/b>halt until Congress expressly authorizes the project.<\/p>\n

\u201cEach President is a temporary tenant, not the owner, of the White House and its Executive Residence,\u201d Judges Patricia A. Millett and Bradley N. Garcia wrote in their majority opinion.<\/p>\n

They stayed their ruling for 14 days to allow the White House to appeal to the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n

Trump relied on private donations to begin the project without seeking an appropriation from Congress, touting the arrangement as a boon to taxpayers. But the courts have found that private financing did not allow him to bypass the separate requirement that Congress authorize major changes to the White House grounds.<\/p>\n

Trump announced the 90,000-square-foot addition last year and swiftly demolished<\/a> the White House\u2019s East Wing without warning to make space for the project. He has said presidents have long needed a ballroom to host VIPs.<\/p>\n

The project has drawn scrutiny from congressional Democrats, who have opened investigations into whether Trump has made promises to donors in exchange for their gifts. The ballroom has also been generally panned<\/a> by the public, with polls finding that most Americans are against the project.<\/p>\n

GOP leaders in Congress earlier this year said they supported the project, but they have not prioritized<\/a> legislation to authorize it. Some Republicans have also questioned the need to fund the project <\/b>and whether Trump has been fully transparent about its scope. Internal estimates earlier this year by a contractor said that the project would cost $600 million, with half coming from taxpayers, according to a Washington Post investigation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Trump has sought private funding for several of his Washington-area projects, including a planned triumphal arch<\/a> and a statuary garden<\/a>, as part of an effort to rush their construction.<\/p>\n

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a nonprofit that is charged by Congress with helping preserve historic buildings, in December sued<\/a> to block ballroom construction, saying that Trump had wrongly skipped required reviews before demolishing the East Wing and that only Congress could authorize significant changes to the White House grounds.<\/p>\n

Read more Tariffs on brass instruments come too late for unemployed Ohio factory workers<\/a><\/p>\n

The Trump administration has moved<\/a> ahead even as the court challenge has played out, with whirring cranes and teams of construction workers now a regular part of the White House backdrop. Trump has said he hopes to hold events in the ballroom before he is scheduled to leave office in January 2029.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Construction for the ballroom project on the former site of the White House’s East Wing, seen June 7. (Tom Brenner\/For The Washington Post)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The National Trust hailed Friday\u2019s ruling.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a great day for our country and for the American people\u2019s right to voice their opinions about the historic places they cherish, including the White House,\u201d Brent Leggs, the organization\u2019s CEO, said in a statement. \u201cThe White House, a global landmark that symbolizes American identity and the ideals of democracy, belongs to the American people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump, who has been fixated on the ballroom project<\/a> and frequently invokes it in speeches and on social media, has said that the facility is necessary to protect presidents. The military is also building a \u201cvast complex\u201d under the ballroom, Trump has said, although he and military officials have declined to offer many details about that part of the project.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike usual, everything I do, they get sued, but I win the suits,\u201d Trump said in remarks in Las Vegas on Wednesday. \u201cBut it\u2019s unbelievable what\u2019s happening. It\u2019s a tremendous military complex. And for 150 years at the White House, we don\u2019t have a ballroom, we don\u2019t have a big space.\u201d<\/p>\n

Millett, an appointee of President Barack Obama, and Garcia, an appointee of President Joe Biden, said that Trump is allowed to continue belowground work as well as construction on matters related to national security.<\/p>\n

In their nearly 100-page opinion, the two judges rejected the Trump administration\u2019s arguments that the National Trust did not have standing to bring its case. The judges also stressed the need for separation of powers, saying that it was Congress\u2019s responsibility to perform oversight of White House construction projects and ensure the safety of future presidents.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is why, throughout history, Presidents have lived in the house the people built,\u201d Millett and Garcia wrote. \u201cExecutive actions that take control of that property out of the hands of the people\u2019s representatives while irreparably harming the historical and visual architecture of perhaps the most prominent public building in the United States seriously intrude on the public interest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Judge Neomi Rao, a Trump appointee, dissented from Friday\u2019s ruling.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe equities in this case turn on complex architectural and security determinations best made by the Secret Service and the military \u2014 not judges,\u201d Rao wrote. She also agreed with the administration that the National Trust lacked standing.<\/p>\n

Trump administration lawyers argued<\/a> in June to the panel that Trump had authority to make changes to the White House grounds.<\/p>\n

Yaakov Roth, a Justice Department lawyer, also told the panel that federal courts should not have the power to stop the ballroom\u2019s construction. He contended that only a few people, such as those affected by the noise of construction, had standing to sue to stop the project or other changes that a president might wish to make to national landmarks.<\/p>\n

Millett and Garcia flatly rejected that claim Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is wrong,\u201d they wrote. \u201cThe bold assertion that the Executive can act with utter lawlessness, destroying treasured national landmarks and harming the interests of individuals, and that no court can stop it flouts our constitutional order.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Trump says he\u2019d \u2018probably get along\u2019 with Jeffries as House speaker<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An appeals court ruled earlier Friday that construction must stop until Congress authorizes the project. The ballroom is among the president\u2019s top priorities for this term.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8833,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting"],"yoast_head":"\nTrump says he\u2019ll bring ballroom fight to Supreme Court after lower court halts work - 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=8834\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Trump says he\u2019ll bring ballroom fight to Supreme Court after lower court halts work - Moving Insider USA\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"An appeals court ruled earlier Friday that construction must stop until Congress authorizes the project. 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