The White House hosted a reception Wednesday night for the organization that manages donations to President Donald Trump’s ballroom, highlighting the president’s unceasing drive for a legally embattled project that polls show is broadly unpopular.
Amid a war with Iran, surging gas prices and backlash to his immigration policies, Trump dedicates extensive time to the ballroom. He made calls for a new ballrooma key focus of his remarks following the shooting at the White House correspondents’ dinner last month, arguing that it was needed for security.
A division president from Clark Construction, one of the largest construction firms in the region, now works most days out of a trailer on the White House grounds as a high-stakes site manager. Some evenings the president calls him into the Oval Office to go over details for more than an hour at a time, he recounted to an associate.
Out of hundreds of lawsuits and appeals involving the administration, the challenge to the ballroom is the only one where the president has personally dictated multiple legal filings.
Spending time on the ballroom is how Trump likes to unwind at the end of a long workday, a person familiar with the conversations said.
“His version of a bourbon is construction,” the person said.
Wednesday evening’s reception hosted the Trust for the National Mall and included sponsors of the organization’s annual gala, as well as its campaign to restore Lafayette Square and other monuments in honor of the nation’s 250th anniversary celebration. Some of the sponsors of those initiatives are also publicly disclosed donors to the planned ballroom, including Palantir, HP and Caterpillar.
Trump has frequently hosted business leaders at the White House who have financially supported the ballroom and celebrations for the 250th anniversary, which critics have said creates the appearance that companies can pay to access the president and influence his policies. The ballroom has been a fixation for Trump throughout his second term, and he often talks about it more than other priorities, such as the TrumpRx website his administration made to help Americans with drug prices.
Earlier Wednesday, Trump shared a lengthy post on Truth Social defending the price of the project, which he initially said would cost $200 million but now says will cost about $400 million. The price has risen because the size of the ballroom has grown, he said.
In addition to that $400 million cost, which Trump insists will be covered by private donors, Senate Republican leaders have prepared legislation to provide $1 billion for security enhancements, including underground construction, that the White House says is related to the ballroom. The White House said the legislation would effectively authorize and pay for the full project. A spokeswoman for Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who released the funding package, said it would not cover “non-security elements,” such as general construction.
President Trump and first lady Melania Trump hosted the reception, which was also attended by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and members of the National Park Service, which manages the National Mall, said Trust spokeswoman Julie Moore. The event was closed to the press, and the White House did not respond to a request for a guest list.
The reception was focused on “America’s Ball for the Mall,” the Trust’s reception on the National Mall for legacy restoration projects, education and programming in honor of the 250th anniversary celebrations. The funds raised by the gala do not support the White House ballroom project, and other first ladies, including Jill Biden, have participated in the event, Moore said.
The Trust for the National Mall effectively functions as a bank account for the funds that the administration has raised. It accepts and manages donations from companies and individuals who wish to support the ballroom. The organization stands to make millions of dollars from this role, collecting a management fee up to 2.5 percent — which could be about $10 million if Trump secures $400 million. Trump said in October he had amassed $350 million in private donations. The White House has not provided an updated figure.
Congress has been in no rush to get involved, especially after polling consistently has shown a majority of Americans opposed to the project following Trump’s demolition of the East Wing. Americans reject the ballroom project by a 2-to-1 margin, according to a Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll released last week. Support has not significantly changed since the White House correspondents’ dinner shooting.
Democrats have viewed the ballroom’s unpopularity as an advantage in the midterm election campaign as they seek to win back control of Congress. Dan Pfeiffer, a former adviser to President Barack Obama and podcast host, said that Trump’s continued focus on the ballroom is a gift to Democrats eager to criticize Republicans for having misplaced priorities.
“This is a layup for Democrats, because we don’t even have to work that hard to highlight the ballroom,” Pfeiffer wrote in a blog post Tuesday. “Trump can’t shut up about it.”
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