See the full timeline of Trump’s $400 million White House ballroom and military complex

The White House said the new ballroom would seat 650 people, an upgrade from the East Room’s 200-person capacity, and that Trump and “other patriot donors” would provide the funds.

McCrery Architects, based in Washington, DC, was announced as the lead architect, with construction work led by Maryland-based Clark Construction.

“The President and the Trump White House are fully committed to working with the appropriate organizations to preserving the special history of the White House while building a beautiful ballroom that can be enjoyed by future Administrations and generations of Americans to come,” White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said in a statement.

The National Capital Planning Commission, a federal agency tasked with approving construction work and renovations on government buildings in the DC area, met to discuss Trump’s planned White House ballroom.

Will Scharf, whom Trump appointed as the chair of the National Capital Planning Commission, said the agency did not need to approve demolition work on the White House grounds because it has jurisdiction only over “vertical build,” not site preparation work.

“I think any assertion that this commission should have been consulted earlier than it has been, or it will be, is simply false,” he said at the meeting.

Guests at the dinner included representatives from companies donating funds to Trump’s ballroom, such as Amazon, Apple, Coinbase, Comcast, Google, Lockheed Martin, Meta, and T-Mobile.

In a statement, the White House called the renovation “a bold, necessary addition that echoes the storied history of improvements and additions from commanders-in-chief to keep the executive residence as a beacon of American excellence.”

Trump also showed reporters architectural renderings of the new ballroom.

The White House shared a list of 37 ballroom donors with Business Insider, including Big Tech companies and wealthy individuals such as oil tycoon Harold Hamm, Blackstone CEO Stephen A. Schwarzman, and the Winklevoss twins.

Former White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who left her role in late August, had previously told reporters that the East Wing would be “modernized” and that “the necessary construction will take place.”

Despite the project’s lack of approval from the National Capital Planning Commission, bulldozers razed the East Wing.

In the lawsuit, the National Trust for Historic Preservation called the construction of the White House ballroom “unlawful,” writing that the plans were not filed with the National Capital Planning Commission, no environmental impact statement was prepared, and no congressional approval was given.

The preservation organization asked the court to halt work at the site until the project undergoes the “legally mandated review processes, including a public comment period.”

“The White House is arguably the most evocative building in our country and a globally recognized symbol of our powerful American ideals,” Carol Quillen, president and CEO of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, said in a statement. “As the organization charged with protecting places where our history happened, the National Trust was compelled to file this case.”

In a statement, White House spokesperson David Ingle said that Trump “has full legal authority to modernize, renovate, and beautify the White House — just like all of his predecessors did.”

The Washington Post reported that James McCrery II of McCrery Architects exited as lead architect of the White House ballroom and was replaced by Shalom Baranes of Shalom Baranes Associates, who renovated the Pentagon after the September 11 terrorist attacks. McCrery would remain a consultant on the project, the White House said.

“Shalom is an accomplished architect whose work has shaped the architectural identity of our nation’s capital for decades and his experience will be a great asset to the completion of this project,” White House spokesman Davis Ingle told The Post in a statement.

Baranes made his first public appearance since taking over the project at a National Capital Planning Commission meeting in January. He presented the plans for the East Wing Modernization Project to the 12-person commission — normally a required step for construction on federal buildings — three months after the East Wing had already been demolished.

The presentation revealed that the ballroom itself will measure 22,000 square feet, with 40-foot ceilings and enough space to seat 1,000 people. New offices, a commercial kitchen, and a reconstructed movie theater will also be built, with a total combined area of nearly 90,000 square feet.

US District Judge Richard Leon of the District of Columbia ruled that Trump must stop construction of the White House ballroom until the project receives congressional approval.

“The President of the United States is the steward of the White House for future generations of First Families,” the judge said. “He is not, however, the owner!”

While the judge’s ruling halted above-ground construction, it allowed work related to “the safety and security of the White House” to continue. Trump confirmed this work was related to a new Presidential Emergency Operations Center, telling reporters aboard Air Force One that the ballroom would sit above the new, “massive” secure facility.

“We have bio defense all over,” he said. “We have secure telecommunications and communications all over. We have bomb shelters that we’re building. We have a hospital and very major medical facilities that we’re building. We have all of these things, so that’s called: I’m allowed to continue building as necessary.”

During the required public comment period, the National Capital Planning Commission received around 32,000 messages from across the US about Trump’s planned ballroom — most of them negative, a March New York Times analysis found. Nevertheless, the commission voted to approve the East Wing Modernization Project.

Trump wrote on Truth Social that the ballroom was still “ahead of schedule” and “under budget,” despite the estimated cost doubling from $200 million to $400 million.

“The only reason the cost has changed is because, after deep rooted studies, it is approximately twice the size, and a far higher quality, than the original proposal, which would not have been adequate to handle the necessary events, meetings, and even future Inaugurations,” the president wrote.

Citing internal documents from Clark Construction, The Washington Post reported that, in March, the contractor estimated the ballroom’s total cost at $600 million — $200 million more than the figure shared by the White House.

The Washington Post also reported that while Trump had repeatedly said that no taxpayer money would be used to fund the ballroom, Clark Construction estimates showed that over half of the $600 million total construction cost was marked as coming from taxpayer-funded sources, including the US Secret Service, the White House Military Office, and the Executive Residence.

White House spokesman David Ingle told Business Insider that the initial press release announcing the construction of the ballroom had noted the project’s coordination with the White House Military Office and the Secret Service.

“President Trump and generous American patriots are funding the ballroom to the tune of approximately $400 million, which will be a secure and appropriate venue for Presidents for generations to come,” Ingle said.

A senior Trump administration official told Business Insider that while the ballroom “will be built with private donations the president has secured,” security upgrades to the White House complex, totaling $385.8 million, will be apportioned as part of an interagency agreement.

“The administration and the president have been very clear about the need for additional security at the White House complex and the role the Secret Service, in addition to other White House components, will play in supporting the necessary security elements for the White House complex, including a new visitor screening center and other campus hardening measures,” the senior official said.

The Supreme Court on Monday, in a 5-4 ruling, allowed the Trump administration to continue above-ground construction, staying a lower-court ruling from US District Judge Richard Leon that had halted the work.

The ruling came after the Trump administration made an emergency request to the Supreme Court to allow construction to continue despite the lawsuit filed by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Chief Justice John Roberts had temporarily paused the lower court’s injunction while the justices considered the request, but ultimately dissented with the Supreme Court’s three liberal judges, saying: “Construction of the ballroom has proceeded apace for the better part of a year. That construction is likely unlawful.”

Still, the court did not rule on the project’s legality; it said that “the government is likely to prevail in showing that the Trust lacks Article III standing to challenge the project in federal court.”

It’s a win for the Trump administration, which has argued that completing the entire East Wing complex was “vitally required by national security” and that the project was already “65% finished,” though government spending records reviewed by The Washington Post suggest the project is substantially less complete.

In late August, additional structures could be seen rising from the construction site.