RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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See the full story · 2 sourcesThe president and administration officials increasingly turn to ‘national security’ arguments to defend the construction of a nuclear-blast-resistant venue
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What began as Donald Trump’s plan for an ornate White House ballroom stuffed with gold finishes and marble floors is increasingly looking like a highly fortified military installation.
After Trump unilaterally decided to demolish the East Wing to make room for the sprawling addition to the executive mansion, the White House has revealed in court filings in recent months that the ballroom is not the primary purpose for the facility. Instead, the government is building a massive underground bunker and a rooftop military complex with a bulletproof, hermetically sealed ballroom sandwiched in between.
A months-long legal battle has stalled construction, but the president is asking the Supreme Court to intervene and let him build what Trump has called a “desperately needed National Security structure” that government lawyers say is vital to the safety and security of the president.
Trump never once mentioned the word “ballroom” in a lengthy post defending the project on Truth Social but instead lashed out at “TREASONISTS” who sued to stop the building. He later called it a “Military Complex/Ballroom” and shared AI-generated images of himself and George Washington strolling through its halls.
The president told reporters at the White House on Monday that military officials approached him with plans for the military complex after he announced his intentions to build a ballroom, claiming they told him there is an “opportunity to build deep into the ground and build a military facility to go with the White House — and to go with all of Washington, D.C., which would be so valuable.”
“Then it became more than just a ballroom,” Trump said.
Federal courts have blocked parts of the project from moving forward without approval from Congress. But Democratic and Republican leaders don’t seem interested in getting involved, even as the administration “desperately” pleads for permission to build.
A federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. ordered the government to stop construction on the ballroom by Aug. 21 unless Congress steps in.
“This decision, made after much of the work has been done and paid for, is a National Security Threat at the highest level,” Trump raged on his Truth Social earlier this month . “It is also a National Disgrace.”
The Supreme Court is expected to decide next steps this week.
“We don’t believe we have to go to Congress. We believe Congress has already given us the authority to do what we’re doing,” Attorney General Todd Blanche said during an appearance on Fox News Sunday . “Many presidents have done a tremendous amount of work to the White House, as they should, and Congress has authorized them to do so.”
In court filings, the Department of Justice has repeatedly claimed that alleged attempts to assassinate the president — including an alleged plot to target the UFC cage match on the White House lawn and, most recently, a potential Iranian strike on Air Force One — have demonstrated a “compelling need” to build the ballroom fortress.
In May, government lawyers sprinted to federal court after a shooting near the White House. They said the shooting underscored the “critical need” for the ballroom project.
Trump was inside the White House at the time and unharmed, but the proposed ballroom would provide a “SAFE HAVEN” from would-be attackers in the future, according to a Truth Social-inspired filing from the Justice Department.
The ballroom is “a knitted, unified, cohesive part of the East Wing Project, which is vital for National Security, and is being constructed to ensure that the President can perform his constitutional duties in a safe and heavily secured facility,” government lawyers wrote.
The four-page filing then complained that the legal battle had forced officials to reveal “top secret” details about the project — including “heavy steel, drone-proof roof, missile-resistant and drone-proof columns, bullet, ballistic, and blast-proof glass, Military-grade venting for air conditioning and heating” as well as “bomb shelters, a state of the art hospital and medical facilities, Top Secret military installations, structures, and equipment, protective partitioning, and other features.”
The ballroom’s rooftop will be “hermetically sealed to prevent malign forces from contaminating the circulating air, thereby threatening the lives of those inside,” according to court filings.
Materials used “are meant to stop bombs, rockets, missiles, and even nuclear blast,” officials wrote.
The following month, hours after federal prosecutors charged five men for an alleged attempt to attack the UFC event, government attorneys wrote that the ballroom is “designed to defend against just such attacks” with a “ highly sophisticated Drone Port and Sniper Nests .”
On his own Truth Social page , Trump posted several images of mocked-up designs for a “drone port” on the ballroom’s roof depicting numerous military drones, armed soldiers and refueling trucks that turn the typically placid grounds of the White House into a major military installation.
“This great and very important military asset sits atop the heavily protected Ballroom at the White House. It provides National Security for Washington, D.C., and will protect future Presidents!!!” Trump wrote earlier this month.
In last week’s appeal to the Supreme Court , U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer treated the ballroom more of a feature of the project, not the main event.
He called it an “integrated military complex, including a totally secure ballroom space, at the East Wing of the White House, which is vitally required by national security.”
But officials are still highlighting what began as Trump’s pet construction project on White House grounds. Renderings in Supreme Court filings show gol...
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