Trump Asks the Supreme Court to Let the Ballroom Keep Rising — the Project Is Now 65% Complete

Solicitor General D. John Sauer filed an emergency application at the Supreme Court on Aug. 14 asking the justices to let construction of the White House ballroom continue. The filing follows an Aug. 7 decision by the D.C. Circuit upholding District Judge Richard Leon's injunction, which would bar aboveground work while the National Trust for Historic Preservation's lawsuit proceeds. Sauer said the injunction would wrongly make a single district judge the arbiter of what construction is "strictly necessary" to protect the president, his family and visiting officials. He told the court the project is 65 percent complete, with a 250-person crew working 20 hours a day, and said no taxpayer funds are being used.

The dispute turns partly on standing: whether the Trust's members are concretely injured by a building they object to on aesthetic and historical grounds. Beneath that is the question the appeals court reached, which is whether a structure of this scale on the White House grounds requires congressional authorization.

The appeals ruling has not taken effect, so work continues. The justices' deadline to act is Aug. 21. The Trust said the administration is attempting to outrun the courts and urged the application be denied.