President Donald Trump’s appointees on the Commission of Fine Arts on Thursday asked questions about the proposed design and scale of a White House ballroom expansion, during an online hearing that also addressed public comments received ahead of the meeting.
The session, which included a review of mostly negative feedback on Trump’s plans, did not present an immediate threat to Trump’s overall idea. Historic preservationists, however, are separately seeking court action to pause the project while a judge considers a preliminary injunction request.
Rodney Mims Cook Jr., the new Fine Arts chairman, opened the panel’s first public hearing on the proposal by saying the ballroom expansion is “an important thing to the president” and “an important thing to the nation.” Cook also told the commissioners that the United States cannot host major events in temporary structures, saying, “You can’t have the United States of America entertaining people in tents,” and framing the question as whether the project can be carried out “in a way that this building remains” true to its “fundamental character” while also meeting the president’s needs.
During the meeting, Fine Arts lead architect Shalom Baranes presented renderings of the planned changes. Commissioners then asked Baranes to return to a future in-person session with 3D scale models that would show the White House complex and the addition. Baranes said that an in-person presentation would also include scale models of other nearby government buildings—specifically the U.S. Treasury Department building to the east and the Eisenhower Executive Office Building to the west.
The commissioners and Baranes appeared to acknowledge existing concerns about the project’s size and whether it can be integrated into the presidential residence’s setting. Cook characterized the addition’s scale as “immense” and asked whether an element could be toned down if the administration’s goal was simply “cover.” Baranes responded that his team looked at covering options at different scales and with different numbers of columns, but said “there’s a president’s desire to proceed with this one.”
Baranes also described how architects say they plan to address the building’s fit and visual impact. He confirmed that the overall addition would be almost 90,000 square feet, with about 22,000 square feet for the ballroom itself. He said the White House was about 55,000 square feet before the East Wing—built in 1902 and expanded in the 1940s—was demolished, and he outlined plans to set the addition’s north boundary back from the existing North Portico and align the top of the new structure with the White House’s primary facade.
Baranes said a new two-story east side colonnade would connect the main structure to the ballroom addition, replacing what he described as a previously demolished single-story portion. He also said architects had contemplated adding a second story atop the West Wing to address symmetry concerns, but he said it was only a concept and that there had been no structural analysis of whether the existing West Wing could support another level.
Other commissioners said Baranes’s responses did not fully address how the design would change views from the South Lawn. They pointed to renderings that show a 10-column, multistory porch on the south side of the addition resembling the Treasury Department’s building more than any part of the White House.
Thomas Luebke, the commission’s executive director, told the group that public comments received online ahead of the meeting were “almost all” negative, criticizing the process, the design, or both. Luebke read one comment he described as “more positive,” which praised the design and style shown in renderings but still said the scale appears oversized and that the main structure would be dominated.
The hearing was part of a broader series of meetings and public hearings involving the Fine Arts panel and the National Capital Planning Commission, which have roles in assessing and approving federal construction projects in Washington. A West Wing spokesman, Davis Ingle, said in a statement that Trump was “working 24/7” and that the administration’s plans included “historic beautification of the White House.”
Separate from the Fine Arts review, historic preservationists are seeking a court order to suspend construction of Trump’s $400 million ballroom project. U.S. District Judge Richard Leon did not rule from the bench after hearing arguments Thursday, and he said he hopes to issue a decision sometime next month on the request for a preliminary injunction, adding that his decision likely would be appealed regardless of how he rules.
Plaintiff’s attorney Thad Heuer argued that the president, who is a temporary occupant of the White House, needed congressional approval before starting a project of that magnitude and cost, and he told the judge, “He isn’t the landlord. He is a steward.” Government lawyer Jacob Roth argued that the president has statutory authority and broad discretion to modify the White House and said stopping mid-project would create problems, including security concerns for the president, while telling Leon, “I don’t think there’s any question that this modernization is in the public’s interest.”