WASHINGTON — An appeals court ruled on Saturday that construction on President Trump’s ambitious $400 million White House ballroom project can continue for a few more days, citing national security considerations.
Last month, a lower-court judge issued a preliminary injunction to halt the project, which was set to be enforced on April 14.
However, a panel of three judges from a federal appeals court extended the deadline to April 17. This extension allows more time to evaluate the administration’s claim that halting the project could compromise the security of the White House.
In court documents submitted last week, Trump’s legal team expressed concern that a halt would leave the Executive Mansion exposed and vulnerable due to the ongoing reconstruction, which includes a massive excavation adjacent to the White House.
The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit granted the extension in a 2-1 decision. The panel noted that, given the limited information available, it could not definitively assess the national security implications at this stage.
Alongside the ballroom construction, Trump’s team is reportedly enhancing the White House’s “doomsday” bunker, located beneath the former East Wing site. The ballroom is planned to be situated above the Presidential Emergency Operations Center, a nuclear bunker dating back to the 1940s.
“Now the military is building a big complex under the ballroom, which has come out recently because of a stupid lawsuit that was filed,” Trump grumbled to reporters aboard Air Force One last month.
Since the Trump administration began facing litigation over the new ballroom, it has repeatedly cited national security concerns to justify continued work on the project.
But late last month, Judge Richard Leon, a President George W. Bush appointee, ruled that “unless and until Congress blesses this project through statutory authorization, construction has to stop!”
The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a nonprofit group chartered by Congress to help with preservation efforts for historic buildings in the US, began suing Trump over his plans for a 90,000-square-foot White House ballroom last year.
The group has complained that Congress was not involved in the decision-making process behind the ritzy ballroom construction plans. It has also shrugged off Trump’s national security concerns.
“Defendants appear to contend that being prevented from illegally constructing a massive ballroom constitutes a national security emergency. It plainly does not,” the National Trust wrote.
The National Trust is also suing the president’s team over renovations to the Trump-Kennedy Center.
The ballroom project has long been a dream of Trump’s, who offered to pay for it during the Obama administration but was turned down. Trump has been making a flurry of renovations to the White House during his second term.
The president has courted private donors, and kicked in money himself, to help foot the bill for the massive complex, which is set to be larger than the White House itself. He’s described the planned ballroom as “impenetrable.
“It’s bulletproof, and it’s ballistic-proof. It’s very thick,” Trump told reporters of the planned structure last month. “It’s going 45 feet high, and every window is covered, every door is covered, the roof is drone-proof. We have secure air handling systems. You know, bad things happen in the air.”
