Days after Senate Republicans proposed pumping $1 billion in public funds into President Donald Trump’s massive White House ballroom project, the president is nonetheless sticking to his claim that it will be a relative steal that will be paid for with just $400m from donors.
Writing on Truth Social, the president said the gigantic structure is “going up rapidly” on the site where the historic White House East Wing stood until he unilaterally ordered it demolished six months ago.
He then claimed that the cost for the ballroom, which the White House had initially pegged at $200 million, had gone up to $400 million “after deep rooted studies” and decisions to double the size of the project and build it at “a far higher quality than the original proposal, which would not have been adequate to handle the necessary events, meetings, and even future Inaugurations.”
“The original price was 200 Million Dollars, the double sized, highest quality completed project will be something less than 400 Million Dollars. It will be magnificent, safe, and secure,” he said.
He later added: “Actually, it is coming in ahead of schedule, and under budget! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”
Trump’s latest claim about the deeply unpopular ballroom project comes just two days after Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley released legislative text for the proposed GOP partisan border spending package that would allocate a whopping $1 billion to be spent over the next three fiscal years“for the purposes of security adjustments and upgrades” within the perimeter of the White House Compound to support enhancements by the U.S. Secret Service “relating to the East Wing Modernization Project” — the official name for Trump’s ballroom.
A spokesperson for the senator claimed that none of the $1 billion could go to the ballroom itself and stressed that the bill Grassley has introduced says “none of the funds” can be spent on “non-security elements of the East Wing Modernization Project.”
The spokesperson, Hannah Akey, told The Independent it would be allocated to “Secret Service enhancements, including, but not limited to security enhancements” that would “ensure all presidents, their families and their staffs are adequately protected.”
“After three attempted assassinations against the current president, it’s clearer than ever that investing in Secret Service is essential,” Akey said.
Yet Trump and his aides have described the proposed ballroom itself as a massive security feature, citing the use of bullet-resistant glass and “drone-proof” roof materials in the construction.
Even in the wake of last month’s attempted shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, that argument was not enough to convince a federal judge, Richard Leon, who has ordered that above-ground work on the project be halted until it receives approval from Congress, though that order is on hold for now.
The project remains underwater with voters, as a a Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll released last month showed that only 28 percent of respondents supported the idea of a ballroom.
