President Donald Trump, top officials in his administration and many MAGA figures are strongly pushing for a White House ballroom to be built, citing a shooting incident just outside the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner that led to his evacuation from the event at the Washington Hilton on Saturday night.
Trump and his backers say building the controversial and legally challenged $400 million grand ballroom that he envisions is essential to keeping him — and future presidents — safe from assassination attacks and other security threats.
But critics argue that a ballroom at the White House would not be accepted as a substitute for a private venue for non-governmental events and that presidents would undoubtedly travel around the country and world, appearing in public at many venues.
Despite that first claim, the Department of Justice, in a letter Sunday to a lawyer whose client is challenging the construction of the ballroom, suggested that the White House Correspondents’ Association could have its annual dinner at the ballroom once it is built.
“When the White House ballroom is complete, President Trump and his successors will no longer need to venture beyond the safety of the White House perimeter to attend large gatherings at the Washington Hilton,” Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate wrote Gregory Craig, who is representing the National Trust for Historical Preservation in its lawsuit seeking to block the ballroom from being built without Congress’s say-so.
