Trump’s White House Ballroom: Plans, Cost, and Who’s Really Paying

by TexasDigitalMagazine.com


Photo: White House

Donald Trump may be the only person who’s ever stood before a crowd and boasted, “I’m very good at building ballrooms.” While Trump is known for making self-aggrandizing claims with no basis in reality, he’s actually trying to prove this one is true with a high-stakes addition to the White House.

In June 2025, Trump revealed on Truth Social that the White House would soon have a new ballroom, “compliments of a man known as Donald J. Trump.” A month later, the White House announced vague plans to build a 90,000-square-foot state ballroom off the East Wing. That’s nearly double the size of the residence, making this the biggest White House renovation in decades. While Trump has always said he would pay for the ballroom himself, it’s unclear how much he’ll actually contribute to the project. Construction began in mid-September, though the many details about the project are still a mystery.

Here’s a guide, which we’ll keep updated, to everything we know about the new White House ballroom, including artist renderings, cost estimates, and the construction timeline.

When did Trump announce his ballroom plan?

Trump started talking about building a White House ballroom before he even entered politics. It became clear that this was more than just weird Trumpian musing in June 2025, when he revealed on Truth Social that he’d selected a site for the project:

On July 31, 2025, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced that construction of a 90,000-square-foot ballroom would begin soon, with McCrery Architects as lead architect:

On August 5, 2025, Trump took a “little walk” on the White House roof with architect Jim McCrery to get a bird’s-eye view of where the building will go:

Will the ballroom be named after Trump?

It seems so, though Leavitt did not highlight this in the initial announcement. Potential donors received a pledge agreement that refers to “The Donald J. Trump Ballroom at the White House,” according to CBS News.

How much will the ballroom cost?

Approximately $200 million, according to the White House.

How big will it be?

The White House initially said it will seat 650 people, but in a September 13 interview with NBC News, Trump said the capacity will actually be 900 people.

“We’re making it a little bigger. It will be top of the line, as good as it can get anywhere in the world,” he said.

Is Trump paying for the White House ballroom?

While ranting about a White House ballroom over the years, Trump always made it sound like he’d pay for it on his own. But Leavitt said, “President Trump, and other patriot donors, have generously committed to donating the funds necessary to build this approximately $200 million structure.”

The White House has declined to give details on how much Trump will actually pay and who exactly these “other patriot donors” might be. When asked on August 1 if he’d block foreign donations, Trump said he hadn’t thought about that: “I’m not looking for that. You have very strong restrictions. And we go by the restrictions.”

The funding plan, such as it is, doesn’t sound great from an ethical standpoint. Per the New York Times:

Noah Bookbinder, the president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, or CREW, said the donor funding plan was “highly unusual.”

“There is certainly a risk that donors to this project, which Donald Trump has made clear is important to him, could see it as a way to curry favor with the administration,” he said.

So far the only Trump contribution we know of is the $24.5 million YouTube paid to settle a lawsuit he brought after the site suspended his account following the Capitol riot. Court documents said the money would go to the Trust for the National Mall and the ballroom project.

Who’s donated so far?

The White House has yet to name the donors. But on September 19, 2025, CBS News reported that multiple companies have already pledged to donate $5 million or more to the project:

Google, R.J. Reynolds, Booz Allen Hamilton, Lockheed Martin, Palantir and NextEra Energy have donated, and so have firms in the tech, manufacturing, banking and health industries, sources told CBS News. 

Lockheed Martin is among the companies that have pledged more than $10 million, according to one of the sources. Company officials declined to confirm the amount, but Jalen Drummond, vice president of corporate affairs at Lockheed Martin said in a statement: “Lockheed Martin is grateful for the opportunity to help bring the President’s vision to reality and make this addition to the People’s House, a powerful symbol of the American ideals we work to defend every day.”

Individuals have also pledged to contribute, but the only person identified in the CBS report was Blackstone Group CEO Stephen Schwarzman.

What do donors receive?

They may get their name displayed on the building, but that hasn’t been decided yet. CBS News reported:

The pledge form, which was reviewed by CBS News, gives donors the option to pay in a lump sum or spread their contribution over three installments to be completed by 2027. 

In return, donors are eligible for “recognition associated with the White House Ballroom.” What form that recognition takes is still being discussed, but several sources said the expectation is that names will be etched in the ballroom’s brick or stone.

They’ll also get a big tax write-off:

Meredith O’Rourke, a top political fundraiser for Mr. Trump, is leading the effort, paired with the Trust for the National Mall, an organization that supports the National Park Service. The trust’s nonprofit status means donations come with a federal tax write-off.

When did construction start?

Construction on the project began in mid-September with some tree removal, though the White House has not not even revealed the ballroom’s exact location.

Trump pointed out the work trucks to reporters on Thursday, September 11, noting, “They’ve just started construction of the new ballroom.” The crews were still at work cutting down trees, removing shrubs, and digging up parts of the South Lawn on September 16, as the Washington Post reported.

Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

When asked about the scope of the landscaping project, the White House gave the Post the run around:

On Thursday, a White House official said crews are in the “preservation stage,” in which they move trees, shrubs and other foliage to an off-site nursery for safekeeping. The official said those efforts could last several weeks. The official referred questions about landscaping details to the National Park Service, which manages the White House grounds.

A spokeswoman for the Park Service said she could not give the number of White House trees affected by the project or the status of those that had already been trimmed or felled.

Will the government shutdown delay ballroom construction?

Nope! Just before the shutdown went into effect a White House official told ABC News, “There will not be a stoppage of ballroom work when the shutdown occurs,” adding, “Work will continue to be performed as the funds currently supporting are not tied to a FY26 enacted appropriation.”

An administration official later told Snopes, “Ballroom construction is continuing as it is financed by private donations, not the federal appropriations that Democrats are holding up to push free health care for illegal immigrants.” Referring to the GOP’s false claim about Democrats’ shutdown demands.

Have the architectural plans been released?

No; presumably they exist, but they have not been made public. As construction began in mid-September, the Washington Post noted that the White House has “not submitted the project to the National Capital Planning Commission, the government body that typically reviews plans for changes to federal property in the capital region.”

Are there renderings of the new ballroom?

Yes; shortly after Leavitt’s announcement, the White House released ten artist renderings of what the new event space will look like from various angles.

Photo: White House
Photo: White House
Photo: White House
Photo: White House
Photo: White House
Photo: White House
Photo: White House
Photo: White House
Photo: White House
Photo: White House

Where will it be located, roughly?

The structure is expected to replace much of the current East Wing. The White House press release on the project emphasized that this part of the building “has been renovated and changed many times”:

The White House Ballroom will be substantially separated from the main building of the White House, but at the same time, it’s theme and architectural heritage will be almost identical. The site of the new ballroom will be where the small, heavily changed, and reconstructed East Wing currently sits. The East Wing was constructed in 1902 and has been renovated and changed many times, with a second story added in 1942. 

What will happen to the offices in the East Wing?

They will be temporarily relocated and “the East Wing will be modernized and renovated,” according to Leavitt.

It’s unclear what this means for the people who currently work there, including the First Lady’s staff. Anita McBride, former chief of staff to First Lady Laura Bush, raised concerns about how the ballroom will impact the daily functioning of the White House.

“Betty Ford always called the East Wing the ‘heart’ of the White House,” McBride told the Hill. “All the business and policy gets done in the West Wing, that’s critically important. But the heart of the White House is the East Wing. And so what, what will be the new East Wing?”

What about public White House tours?

They’ve been suspended indefinitely. The Washington Post reported on August 21:

The administration canceled tours scheduled for September and is not accepting tour requests beyond that, according to multiple congressional offices and an email sent by the White House to congressional offices. On their websites, members of Congress gave various reasons for the moratorium: “scheduled construction,” “extensive renovations” and “construction of President Trump’s new ballroom.”

It’s rare for the White House to cancel all public tours for months or even years. The administration has not responded to journalists questions about the tours.

When will it be finished?

The press release says it’s “expected to be completed long before the end of President Trump’s term” in January 2029.

How long has Trump been planning this ballroom?

For many years, Trump has publicly claimed that he offered to build a collapsible $100 million White House ballroom and the Obama administration did not take him up on it:

Surprisingly, this is at least partially true. In his book Believer: My Forty Years in Politics, David Axelrod confirmed that while he was working in the Obama White House in 2010, Trump called to pitch him on a ballroom. (Trump claims he offered to pay for it himself, but Axelrod did not address that detail.)

“‘I build ballrooms. Beautiful ballrooms,’” Trump said, according to Axelrod. “Not being much of a dancer, I didn’t know where he was headed. ‘I see you have these state dinners on the lawn there in these shitty little tents. Let me build you a ballroom you can assemble and take apart. Trust me. It’ll look great.’”

Axelrod said he handed the pitch off to someone else, and they didn’t follow up.

Is this project really necessary?

The White House State Ballroom is a “much-needed” addition, according to the press release. The East Room, the largest room in White House, can only seat 200 people, which is why state dinners take place in a tent on the lawn.

Back in 2011, Trump lamented that the White House is using “an old, rotten tent that frankly they probably rented, pay a guy millions of dollars for it even though it’s worth about $2?” But as Eater noted, it’s actually a pretty swanky tent:

The tent for the 2009 India dinner, which Vanity Fair described as “a massive pavilion, complete with an orchestra platform, theatrical lighting, a professional sound system, full heating, satellite kitchens, and a dozen chandeliers bedecked with sustainably harvested magnolia branches and ivy,” took six days to construct and cost a reported $85,000.

And the symbolism of this new project is “monstrous,” as New York’s Chris Bonanos pointed out: “That Trump will build a ballroom — the most on-the-nose embodiment of let-them-eat-cake Versailles extravagance — just as he throws old people off Medicare and kids off food stamps is as big a trolling as has ever been trolled.”

So why is Trump really building this ballroom?

Is Trump doing this because he’s a magnanimous builder who wants to share his gift with the American people? Or is he just a narcissist looking to leave his mark on the White House by transforming it into Mar-a-Lago North? That’s a matter of interpretation. But it’s pretty clear that he really, really hates partying in a tent.

This post has been updated throughout.





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