Supreme Court lifts stop-work order for White House ballroom construction

Chief Justice John Roberts issued a one-page order Friday staying a lower court injunction that had blocked above-ground construction on Trump's White House ballroom, letting a 250-person crew keep working 20 hours a day, seven days a week just before a D.C. Circuit ruling would have shut it down entirely.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation sued in December 2025 arguing the administration abused maintenance statutes to justify demolishing the East Wing and erecting a 90,000-square-foot structure without congressional approval. The White House counters that underground security infrastructure — bomb shelters, medical facilities, drone defenses — makes the whole project a national security matter, though only the underground bunker portion had previously won that exception in lower courts.

The project's price tag has grown from a promised $200 million funded entirely by private donors to Trump's own estimate of $400 million, with Washington Post reporting suggesting taxpayers could cover more than half of a total nearing $600 million — and total White House construction costs, including a helipad and Lafayette Square work, potentially topping $900 million.

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