Donald Trump has suggested that a $230 million payment he is reportedly eyeing off as compensation for his past legal battles could be used to help fund his controversial White House ballroom.
As demolition continued on the East Wing of the White House on Tuesday, reports emerged that the president was demanding that his own Justice Department compensate him for the federal investigations he faced during Joe Biden’s presidency.
Asked during a Diwali celebration in the Oval Office to confirm those reports, Trump replied: “They probably owe me a lot of money, but if I get money from our country, I’ll probably do something nice with it, like give it to charity or give it to the White House while we restore the White House.
“As you know, the ballroom is under construction,” he added. “They’ve been trying to get it for 150 years, and I think it’s going to be fantastic. But we’ll see what happens.”
Trump was pursued vigorously in the lead-up to the 2024 election for a series of alleged crimes, but has always maintained he was the victim of a Democratic witch-hunt by a “weaponized” justice system.
According to The New York Times, which first reported on the president’s compensation bid, he has made two claims that predate his return to power.
The first was filed in 2023 and reportedly seeks damages for several purported violations of his rights, including the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election campaign.
The second was filed last year and accuses the F.B.I. of violating his privacy in searching his Mar-a-Lago for classified documents in 2022.
According to the Times, Trump’s filing also accuses the Justice Department of malicious prosecution in charging him with mishandling sensitive records after he left office.
However, now that Trump is in office again, compensation by the Justice Department would present a series of potential ethical conflicts, given DOJ is staffed by some of the key people who served as his personal lawyers.
For instance, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche was his defense attorney in the so-called “hush money” trial, in which Trump was found guilty last year of falsifying business records to cover a sex scandal with porn star Stormy Daniels.
Attorney General Pam Bondi helped defend him during his 2020 impeachment trial, while Lindsey Halligan, who Trump appointed as an interim U.S. Attorney to prosecute former FBI director James Comey, was part of his defense team in the classified documents case.
But Trump didn’t seem fazed when asked about the issue on Tuesday.
“We have numerous cases having to do with the fraud of the election, the 2020 election, and because of everything that we found out, I guess they owe me a lot of money,” he said.
It is also unclear why Trump would need $230 million to pay for his ballroom, given that the $250 million project is supposedly being funded through private donors, some of whom attended a “thank you” dinner at the White House last week.
Among the guests were corporate leaders from tech giants Amazon, Apple and Google; representatives from defense firm Lockheed Martin; and crypto-billionaires the Winklevoss Twins.
At the dinner, Trump bragged that he was told there were “zero zoning conditions” set for the project.
And on Tuesday, he celebrated the demolition of the East Wing while hosting a lunch in the newly paved “Rose Garden Club”.
“You probably hear the beautiful sound of construction to the back,” Trump told Republican senators on day 21 of the government shutdown.
“You hear that sound? Oh, that’s music to my ears. I love that sound.”
However, critics lashed out at the sight of the East Wing, with many describing it as a presidential vanity project.
“It’s not his house. It’s your house. And he’s destroying it,” former Secretary of State and 2016 presidential rival Hillary Clinton posted on social media.
“Ripping apart the White House just like he’s ripping apart the Constitution,” said California Governor Gavin Newsom.
And Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote: “Oh, you’re trying to say the cost of living is skyrocketing?… Donald Trump can’t hear you over the sound of bulldozers demolishing a wing of the White House to build a new grand ballroom.”
The 90,000-square-foot ballroom will eventually cater to more than triple the capacity of the East Room, which is the largest existing event space in the White House and can only hold a maximum of 200 people.
The project has been a longstanding dream for Trump, who first suggested it to then-Obama adviser David Axelrod in 2010.
Fifteen years later, it is one of many changes Trump has made as he remolds the White House in his image.
Since returning to power in January, Trump has also redecorated the Oval Office with gold accents and ornate frames; removed portraits of his predecessors and replaced them with his own; installed two giant flagpoles on the north and south lawn; and paved over the grass in the Rose Garden to create a white patio filled with tacky Mar-a-Lago chairs and tables.
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