Demolition workers on Monday began ripping down the section of the White House that holds offices for the first lady and staff.
“We can confirm that the entire East Wing is going to be modernized and renovated to, I guess, support the … ballroom project,” the official said.
The White House has dismissed the criticism as “manufactured outrage.”
U.S. presidents have renovated and added to the White House and its grounds throughout history, but Trump’s changes are the most significant in decades.
Its letter expressed concern that the proposed 90,000-square-foot ballroom “will overwhelm the White House itself.”
The White House’s entire East Wing will be demolished to create President Donald Trump’s new ballroom, despite the former New York real estate tycoon’s assertion that the project would not disrupt the current U.S. A. historic site.
On Monday, demolition crews started tearing down the first lady’s and staff’s offices in the White House. After pictures of the demolition appeared in news reports, Trump declared that construction had begun, but it wasn’t until two days later that the full scope of the teardown was revealed.
In the Oval Office on Wednesday, Trump told reporters, “We had to demolish the existing structure in order to do it properly.”.
According to an administration official, the demolition process should be completed in two weeks. “We can confirm that the entire East Wing will undergo renovations and modernization in order to, I suppose, support the dot. ballroom project,” the representative stated.
Many Democrats have expressed outrage over the demolition of a portion of one of the country’s most historic buildings, and there are also concerns about whether the Trump administration followed the right procedures. As “manufactured outrage,” the White House has rejected the criticism. “.
When Franklin D. Roosevelt was president in 1942, the East Wing underwent its most recent iteration. “U.”. S. Throughout history, the White House and its grounds have undergone renovations and additions by presidents, but Trump’s changes are the biggest in decades.
“The desecration of the White House by President Trump is a betrayal of his duty to protect our history and heritage and an insult to the American people,” U.S. S. The statement was released on Wednesday by Maine Senator Angus King, an independent.
Although the demolition of the ballroom had already started, the White House announced Tuesday that it would send plans for the project to the National Capital Planning Commission, which is in charge of federal construction in Washington and surrounding states.
The NCPC is chaired by Will Scharf, the White House staff secretary for Trump. Since Scharf was not involved in the ballroom’s planning, he told Reuters on Wednesday that he would be able to view the plans when they were presented to the commission with objectivity.
“I take my responsibilities as NCPC chairman very seriously, and I haven’t had any involvement in the ballroom planning process here at the White House,” he stated.
“Despite his role in both institutions, I would be able to say no to Trump or other White House officials involved in the project,” Scharf said.
“Yes, without a doubt, I am able to cast a vote in my role as NCPC commissioner apart from my responsibilities in the White House. I’ll vote against a project if I don’t like it. He declared, “I will vote for a project if I do like it.”.
TRANSPARENCY QUESTIONS.
The White House has not clarified which organization, if any, should have been in charge of overseeing the East Wing’s demolition. According to Scharf, the NCPC was in charge of construction but not demolition.
As part of a building project review, Bryan Green, a former NCPC commissioner under Democratic President Joe Biden, told Reuters on Tuesday that new construction and demolition should be connected.
Trump on Wednesday said the project would cost $300 million, an increase from its initial $200 million price tag announced in July. He claims that he and private donors are covering the ballroom’s costs, but he hasn’t disclosed all the financial information.
The project’s lack of transparency by his administration was dismissed by the president.
Trump claimed that “these pictures have been in newspapers,” referring to images of the completed ballroom that he had in the Oval Office. On the table before him was a model of the project.
Scharf stated that he anticipated the National Park Service would be sending the ballroom designs to the NCPC for evaluation on behalf of the White House. He stated that there will be at least two, if not three, public meetings where the public can voice their opinions.
The review should take about three months, Scharf said.
“It’s a rigorous process,” he said. “You know, in certain situations, the process can proceed fairly swiftly—in just a few months. We’ve had projects that take a lot longer in other instances. “.”.
On Tuesday, the National Trust for Historic Preservation requested that the Trump administration postpone the demolition until the completion of the planning commission’s review. The proposed ballroom, which is 90,000 square feet, “will overwhelm the White House itself,” the letter said. There are 55,000 square feet in the White House.
The East Wing has already been demolished, so attempts to halt the project are probably going to be challenging.
Local resident Sarah Kavanagh of neighboring Maryland said she visited the White House on Wednesday to witness the demolition firsthand.
Kavanagh, 59, stated, “I genuinely feel like putting a bouquet of flowers for a memorial.”. It seems disgusting to me. “.”.
Jeff Mason provided the reporting, Courtney Rozen added to it, and Colleen Jenkins, Diane Craft, Daniel Wallis, and Leslie Adler edited it.
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Reuters has Jeff Mason as a White House correspondent. He has reported on the presidential campaigns of Biden, Trump, Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John McCain as well as the administrations of Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and Joe Biden. From 2016 to 2017, he presided over the White House Correspondents’ Association as its president, guiding the press corps in promoting press freedom during the early years of the Trump presidency. Deutsche Welle awarded him the “Freedom of Speech Award” in recognition of his and the WHCA’s efforts. Jeff has questioned both foreign and domestic leaders, such as Kim Jong Un of North Korea and Vladimir Putin of Russia, aggressively. He is a co-winner of the Association for Business Journalists’ “Breaking News” award and the recipient of the WHCA’s “Excellence in Presidential News Coverage Under Deadline Pressure” award. Jeff started out as a business reporter in Frankfurt, Germany, and later moved to Brussels, Belgium, to cover the European Union. In addition to teaching political journalism at Georgetown University, Jeff frequently makes appearances on radio and television. A former Fulbright scholar, he graduated from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism for his degree.
