Trump: Ballroom Lawsuit Exposed ‘Top Military Secrets’
President Trump has been the target of a number of recent assassination attempts, including . . . the threat of a missile attack against Air Force One.
The Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court to step in before August 21, when an injunction is set to halt above-ground construction of the new White House ballroom.
The emergency application says a stop-work order would put presidential security at risk and leave the unfinished structure vulnerable. Trump put it more bluntly. He accused the National Trust for Historic Preservation of exposing “Top Military Secrets” by filing the lawsuit.
Solicitor General D. John Sauer also pointed to a July 8 missile threat against Air Force One, grouping it with what he called a “growing number of recent assassination attempts” against Trump.
“President Trump has been the target of a growing number of recent assassination attempts, including . . . the threat of a missile attack against Air Force One on July 8.”
Trump was preparing to leave a NATO summit in Turkey when the threat surfaced. The administration says he was secretly moved from one presidential aircraft in a catering truck and departed aboard another military jet. The press pool, White House staff, and several Cabinet officials believed he had left on the original aircraft.
That episode is part of the administration’s case for finishing the ballroom and East Wing project. The plans call for underground security facilities, military equipment, and what Trump described as a rooftop “DronePort.”
Sauer told the justices:
“The updated East Wing complex is absolutely required and should not be enjoined.”
U.S. District Judge Richard Leon blocked above-ground construction after finding that the administration lacked express congressional authorization. The D.C. Circuit upheld the injunction in a 2-1 ruling. Work below ground involving presidential security may continue, but the order against above-ground construction takes effect August 21 unless the Supreme Court intervenes.
Judge Neomi Roa dissented. She called the injunction a “blatant abuse of discretion” and “judicial overreach beyond the proper province of the federal courts.”
The Trust’s standing argument rests on one member, Alison Hoagland. She says she plans to walk near the White House about once a month and expects the project to injure her aesthetic, cultural, and historical interests. The government calls her a “strolling passerby” whose displeasure with the building’s appearance cannot establish a concrete and particularized injury under Article III.
Trump responded by calling the National Trust’s leaders “TRAITORS” and arguing that their lawsuit forced the administration to disclose sensitive details about the project.
TRUMP: Accuses National Trust for Historic Preservation of revealing top military secrets, including rooftop DronePort plans, in suit against White House security facility pic.twitter.com/h3s24NBBFM
— Trump Truths (@trumptruthsbot) August 15, 2026
“They revealed Top Military Secrets! . . . They were asked by the United States Military not to bring this suit because of the Top Secret nature of the important facility being built.”
The National Trust says the administration unlawfully demolished the East Wing and began the project without congressional authorization or the required review process. Its lawsuit, the group says, seeks compliance with federal law and public review of the project. Trump also singled out National Trust President Carol Quillen, arguing that she lacked standing to challenge the project and was not personally named as a plaintiff, although the organization filed the suit.
Unless the Supreme Court intervenes, the injunction takes effect August 21 against a project that the government says is already 65 percent complete. A 250-person crew is working 20-hour days on a concrete-and-steel superstructure that rises as high as 70 feet above ground.
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Comments
Just guessing… is the military component funded by Congress? If so, it has been ‘approved’ by Congress…. Get it done.
No, that does not follow at all. If it’s being paid out of a general appropriation for presidential security, without specific mention of the erection of a building, then the statutory language (assuming it applies) has not been satisfied.
Sorry that does not work, the project has been privately funded.
First of all, whatever military installations he’s talking about were probably not privately funded. But if they were that makes it even worse, since it would mean there was nothing at all from Congress, so the statute (assuming it applies) is not at all satisfied.
General appropriations are the result of Congress
True and irrelevant. Why do people (including Trump) keep raising the funding source, as if it has anything to do with the issue? The issue isn’t and never was funding. The issue is a building being erected in DC, allegedly in a park, without Congress’s explicit permission. That’s illegal. No military or national security consideration can make it legal.
The big question in my mind is simply whether this law even applies; is the “Presidential Park” a real thing, making the White House a “park” for the purpose of this law. I scanned the relevant statute looking for a definition of “park” and couldn’t find one.
How are the Whitehouse grounds a park? Can I simply walk in? Is it under the Park Service? Who is the head park ranger? Smoky the Bear? That assertion is ridiculous.
It’s not erecting a separate building; it’s a renovation of one wing of an existing structure.
Wrong. The ballroom is not part of the White House, it’s a separate building. So was the East Wing that was demolished to make room for it. That’s why Trump’s promise that the White House itself would not be affected was true.
I hate the left commies
When Karma looks this way, Hoagland is going to be taken out by a deranged thug released more than five times by the DC justice system.
Attention communist left: A Trump assassination will release a vicious genie that will not go back in the bottle.
You have been warned, and we don’t mind spilling your blood.
I’ve had 61 good years and have no fear of your inane bluster.
Ah yes,..THE LIST!
This is the same crowd that complained so bitterly when Truman gutted and remodeled the White House in 1950.
Right?
Dunno, but it makes sense it was them or a similar unconscious group.
.
First of all, there was no new building constructed.
Second, he had specific congressional approval for the whole project.
Most work on the White House over the last 200 years has been specifically approved by Congress, because the president asked Congress to fund it. There have been only a small number of improvements that (1) were privately funded and not approved by Congress, and (2) involved erecting buildings, and thus triggered the statute in question that requires specific permission from congress to erect any building in a park in DC.
If the “Presidential Park” is indeed a park for the purpose of this statute, then those few projects were indeed illegal. The fact that the previous presidents broke the law does not give Trump any right to do so. There is no such thing as a “precedent” for breaking a law.
As far as I can see the only real question is whether “Presidential Park” is a real thing.
If the ballroom construction is really so vital for national security, why didn’t Trump comply with the statute and ask Congress for permission to erect it? He wouldn’t have had to disclose any national secrets. Just say the White House has long needed a ballroom, he has lined up donors to pay for it, there’s no reason Congress should say no. That way no one would have to know about any secret aspect to it.
Even if this National Trust woman has no standing, that doesn’t excuse Trump from complying with the law. It just means she can’t sue him, but he’s still wrong. He has no right to break the law, even if no one can sue him for it.
As far as I can see, the only real question is whether “Presidential Park” is a real thing. I went looking in that statute for a definition of the term “park” and couldn’t find one. But the fact that the government’s own defense says the Park Service is in charge of this project seems to indicate that yes, it is indeed in a park. So permission should have been sought for the construction.
(Note that the statute says nothing at all about demolition; so no permission was needed for that, and those who claim it was needed are just ignorant of the statute’s text. Also, those who accuse Trump of lying when he promised that the White House building itself would not be touched are just ignorant of the fact that the East Wing was a separate building. Trump knew what he was promising, and he kept his word to the letter. This entire project has not touched the main building.)
The new underground complex was in the Pentagon appropriations bill as a part of the Big Beautiful Bill. The Ballroom portion was privately funded. The Ballroom was covered for the underground complex. My speculation is that someone told the Trust members about the whole thing and asked them to file a lawsuit. And since when is “walking by” gives anyone standing in a lawsuit? Furthermore Judge Leon has animus towards President Trump. He was a part of the cabal of Judges handing out sentences for J6 that were over the top outrageous. As well as tolerating these people being held in the American version of a gulag right inside DC.
1. The underground complex is irrelevant. It’s not a construction, and thus doesn’t need permission.
2. That something was in an appropriations bill doesn’t mean Congress gave permission for the construction. If the statute applies, Congress needs to be specifically informed that “We want to erect such-and-such a building, in such-and-such location”, and pass a resolution giving permission. Appropriating money for “security improvements” doesn’t cut it.
3. The ballroom being privately funded is irrelevant. I don’t understand why people, starting with Trump, keep bringing it up. Who cares who’s paying for it? The point is that Congress didn’t approve it.
4. The ballroom being cover for the underground complex is irrelevant. Congress didn’t approve it.
5. Read the decision — there are literally dozens of cases establishing that walking by something does confer standing.
From Trump’s insane rant:
Someone should tell him about 52 USC 3121.
More like 40 U.S.C. § 3312 which excludes the Capitol building and various other DIRECT branches of the US Government from all the fun little regulations about construction in DC. Admittedly, the Legislative branch still has to appropriate the money, but the Executive branch has a certain leeway in how to spend it, which in this case is updating a WWII-era bunker and various below ground security construction, and the eventual anti-drone defenses on top of the new privately-funded ballroom.
And just why would the trust be shown top secret military plans? Isn’t part of the whole “top secret” thing keeping them secret? Were pinky swears involved?
No one forced anyone to show them any plans. But (assuming they have standing) they have the right to sue to enforce the statute. If it was so important to keep scrutiny away from it, then Trump is 100% at fault for not following the law and getting Congress’s permission to erect the ballroom. He only needed to do that and there would be no lawsuit, and thus no need to disclose secrets to anyone.
Why do you keep referring to this renovation of a wing of an existing structure as a “building”, as if it was free-standing and not a replacement for the former wing of the same basic structure? You referenced the underground portion as not being a construction; where did you get THAT definition? If both the underground military portion and the aboveground non-military are upgrades to an existing structure, then neither is considered new construction. I see no legal method to categorize one part of a renovation in one way, and a second part another way.
The East Wing was free-standing, and so will be the new ballroom. That’s why when Trump promised that the project would not affect the main building at all, he was telling the exact truth and those who claim he lied are ignorant of the facts.
I am not arguing whether the trust had the right or duty to sue. My point was that if the project was so vital because it involved such secrets revealing them did not make sense. And as you pointed out no one forced anyone to show them. It seems that whole bit of the kerfuffle could have been skipped over with the usual legal wrangling.
As far as I can tell the administration gave a rather complicated answer to a rather simple question.
“On the other side of the ledger is the flimsiest of harms: one strolling passerby’s subjective displeasure.”
That is the basis for this lawsuit to stop construction? That’s it?
Not the erudite and persuasive seperation of power arguments put forth by one high flying legal eagle, Mr. Milhouse?
In a functioning republic, I would agree with Mr. Milhouse and his assertions that it is Congress – the people’s house – that has the final say about purse and purpose of executive power in regard to public land and structures.
But leftists are fond of screaming we are not a functioning republic. We are a sacred dEmOcRaCy: two wolves and a sheep deciding what is for dinner.
I voted for a Red King, like Trump, to not only protect the sheep, but shoot the wolves.
Would I rather we live in a functioning republic where the legal arguments put forth by Mr. Milhouse win the day as a nation of laws? Yes, when my side wins.
But we are not a nation of laws, and haven’t been for a long time. We are a nation of political will, and I desire my side wins by shooting wolves.
Some screaming leftist has ‘the feels’ about Trump’s WH construction project – not legitimate seperation of power arguments – and asks it be halted.
Why does this person have standing? Why were they not dismissed with prejudice? Because we are a nation of political will, not laws.
And the screaming leftists do not like the Red King shooting wolves, so they will nail any piece of jello to the Red King’s wall in order to gum up his works.
No, that is not the basis for the lawsuit, that’s how the plaintiff tries to establish standing. And there are dozens of cases supporting standing on such a basis.
It’s got nothing to do with the separation of powers. I don’t know where you got the idea that it did. If you think the separation of powers is the basis for this lawsuit then you haven’t been following it and don’t know the first thing about it, and you certainly haven’t been reading my comments, which have never once mentioned it.
The lawsuit is entirely about the law, which Trump must obey whether he likes it or not. Even if the plaintiff has no standing, even if no one has standing, that doesn’t give Trump the right to disobey the law. So the only relevant question is, What does the law actually say, and is Trump actually violating it? Nothing else matters.
Military secrets don’t matter. National security doesn’t matter. What previous presidents may have got away with doesn’t matter. Only the law matters. If Trump wants to defend his actions he needs to argue the law, not bluster about all these irrelevant factors. The law says “park”. Is the White House in a park? I don’t know. My instinct is to doubt it, and yet the government seems to acknowledge that it is.
So if this IS a park, who manages this park/park system?
If it falls under the executive branch, this is all a waste of time.
Why not file counter suits and bankrupt them. I used to be a member and it used to be a fine organization, but when leaders allow it to be used as a partisan political pawn, it should be destroyed. I would even challange their non-profit status.