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President Donald Trump holds a rendering of the proposed new East Wing of the White House as he speaks to reporters aboard Air Force One en route from West Palm Beach, Fla., to Joint Base Andrews, Md., Sunday, March 29, 2026.<\/p>\n
Mark Schiefelbein\/AP<\/p>\n
Work continues on the construction of the ballroom at the White House in Washington, Wednesday, April 1, 2026.<\/p>\n
Allison Robbert\/AP<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump holds a rendering of the proposed new East Wing of the White House as he speaks to reporters aboard Air Force One en route from West Palm Beach, Fla., to Joint Base Andrews, Md., Sunday, March 29, 2026.<\/p>\n
Mark Schiefelbein\/AP<\/p>\n
Work continues on the construction of the ballroom at the White House in Washington, Wednesday, April 1, 2026.<\/p>\n
Allison Robbert\/AP<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump answers questions from reporters after signing an executive order in the Oval Office of the White House Tuesday, March 31, 2026, in Washington.<\/p>\n
Alex Brandon\/AP<\/p>\n
WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 President Donald Trump\u2019s White House ballroom is expected to win approval from a key agency on Thursday, days after a federal judge ordered a halt to construction unless Congress allows what would be the biggest structural change to the American landmark in more than 70 years.<\/p>\n
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The National Capital Planning Commission, the agency tasked with approving construction on federal property in the Washington region, is going ahead with the vote because U.S. District Judge Richard Leon\u2019s ruling on Tuesday affects construction activities, not the planning process, commission spokesperson Stephen Staudigl said.<\/p>\n
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But despite the agency\u2019s expected approval, the judge\u2019s ruling and the legal fight over the ballroom could stall progress on a legacy project that Trump is racing to see completed before the end of his term in early 2029. It\u2019s among a series of changes the Republican president is planning for the nation\u2019s capital to leave his lasting imprint while he\u2019s still in office.<\/p>\n
The vote had initially been scheduled for March but was pushed to Thursday because so many people signed up to comment on it at the commission’s monthly meeting. The comments were overwhelmingly opposed to the ballroom.<\/p>\n
Trump tweaks the ballroom design <\/p>\n
Before voting Thursday, the commission will also consider some design changes to the 90,000-square-foot (8,400-square-meter) ballroom addition that Trump announced aboard Air Force One on Sunday as he flew back to Washington from a weekend at his Florida home.<\/p>\n
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He removed a large staircase on the south side of the building and added an uncovered porch to the west side. Architects and other critics of the project had panned the staircase as too large and basically useless since there was no way to enter the ballroom at the top.<\/p>\n
Trump gave no reason for the changes, but a White House official said the president had considered comments from the National Capital Planning Commission and another oversight entity, the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, which approved the project earlier this year, as well as members of the public.<\/p>\n
The official, who was not authorized to publicly discuss the ballroom design and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that additional \u201crefinements\u201d had been made to the building\u2019s exterior and that lead architect Shalom Baranes would present them on Thursday.<\/p>\n
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The ballroom, now estimated to cost $400 million, has expanded in scope and price tag since Trump first announced the project last summer, citing a need for space other than a tent on the lawn to host important guests. Trump demolished the East Wing in October with little warning, and site preparation and underground work have been underway since then. Officials said above-ground construction would not start until April, at the earliest.<\/p>\n
Judge says Trump isn’t the owner of the White House<\/p>\n
The 12-member National Capital Planning Commission is chaired by Will Scharf, a top White House aide who has spoken in support of the ballroom addition. The president appoints three of the members, and Trump named two other White House officials along with Scharf.<\/p>\n
Trump went ahead with the project before seeking input from the National Capital Planning Commission and the Commission of Fine Arts, which he reconstituted with allies and supporters.<\/p>\n
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The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a private nonprofit organization, sued after Trump demolished the East Wing last fall to build the ballroom addition \u2014 a space nearly twice as big as the mansion itself. Trump says it will be paid for with donations from wealthy people and corporations, including him, though public dollars are paying for underground bunkers and security upgrades on the White House grounds.<\/p>\n
The trust sought a temporary halt to construction until Trump presented the project to both commissions and Congress for approval. Leon, the judge, agreed but said that his order would take effect in two weeks and that construction related to security would be allowed.<\/p>\n
That work continued Wednesday as new photos by The Associated Press show the site of the former East Wing bustling with activity as cranes stretched toward the sky.<\/p>\n
The judge, who was nominated to the bench by Republican President George W. Bush, wrote in his ruling: \u201cThe President of the United States is the steward of the White House for future generations of First Families. He is not, however, the owner!\u201d He concluded that the National Trust for Historic Preservation was likely to succeed on the merits of its claims because \u201cno statute comes close to giving the President the authority he claims to have.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Trump disputed that Congress must also approve his project.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe built many things at the White House over the years. They don\u2019t get congressional approval,\u201d he told reporters in the Oval Office after the ruling.<\/p>\n
Representatives for the House and Senate committees with jurisdiction over the project did not return telephone messages seeking comment. Congress is on spring break.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Donald Trump holds a rendering of the proposed new East Wing of the White House as he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":231740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[32533,145,21219,23681,59373,86795,59371,59372,61262,89680,82,84,83,89678,89677,89679],"class_list":{"0":"post-231739","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-antonio","8":"tag-district-of-columbia","9":"tag-donald-trump","10":"tag-george-w-bush","11":"tag-package-100024-ap-online","12":"tag-package-100373-mc-complete-state-national","13":"tag-product-30117-ap-washington-dc-state-news-no-weather","14":"tag-product-30598-ap-national-news-report-a-wire","15":"tag-product-31998-ap-online-national-news","16":"tag-product-46986-ap-online-top-stories","17":"tag-richard-j-leon","18":"tag-san-antonio","19":"tag-san-antonio-headlines","20":"tag-san-antonio-news","21":"tag-stephen-staudigl","22":"tag-trump-ballroom-white-house-commission-vote-judge","23":"tag-will-scharf"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/231740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}