[WaPo] Trump plans $200M overhaul of East Wing in significant change to White House

Obama had two basketball hoops installed on the White House tennis courts (outrageous, I know).

 

The new "Rose Garden."

Tacky. And of course the umbrellas are gold.

 

New rendition of the ballroom. It seems to have grown.

 

Now, he wants to put an arch across the bridge form the Lincoln Memorial.





Turns out, we just elected a poor man's Albert Speer.

 

Probably pickleball courts by now.

 

Within reason I don't care - and tax payers SHOULD pay for it. I am not comfortable with "donors" paying for it, there is too much of an opportunity for corruption and that goes for all politicians.

I don't have an issue with President's within reason having projects, but I would rather that they did not modify existing structures too much. The changes Trump is making are for the most part not destructive long term to the architecture. I actually kind of like the idea of there being more of an emphasis on art and architecture - even if some may not like the style.

 

Twenty years ago we could complain about Obama wearing a white suit of Bush vomiting on a Japanese official..... now we have far bigger issues.

 

This would be an aesthetic shame. The view of the Lincoln Memorial when crossing the bridge is wonderful.

 

When I get conspiratorial I think that the ballroom is one of the signals that, if breathing, he doesn't intend on leaving office. What about this man suggests he only wants to use it for two years?

 

Why would you want a snake looking thing in front of the White House when you already got one inside?

 

If you "love" this monstrosity, you have truly lost your mind.

Preservation group asks Trump to pause WH ballroom project. The ballroom, set to be 90,000 square feet, would dwarf the main White House residence, which is 55,000 square feet.





The entire East Wing of the White House will be demolished “within days,” according to two Trump administration officials.

The demolition marks a significant expansion of the ballroom construction project from what President Trump said earlier this summer.

“It won’t interfere with the current building,” Trump said on July 31.. “It’ll be near it, but not touching it, and pays total respect to the existing building, which I’m the biggest fan of.”

The extent of the demolition was first reported by The New York Times.

A White House official told NBC News the “entirety” of the East Wing would eventually be “modernized and rebuilt,” while acknowledging the process is fluid.

“The scope and the size of the ballroom project have always been subject to vary as the process develops,” the official told NBC News.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a nonprofit created by Congress to help preserve historic buildings, sent a letter Tuesday to administration officials, warning that the planned ballroom “will overwhelm the White House itself.”

“We respectfully urge the Administration and the National Park Service to pause demolition until plans for the proposed ballroom go through the legally required public review processes,” Carol Quillen, National Trust’s CEO, said in a statement.

The White House argues that it hasn’t been required to submit plans for review by the The National Capital Planning Commission because only demolition — and not technically construction — has begun.

The Commission of Fine Arts, National Capital Planning Commission and DC State Historic Preservation Office are the regulatory agencies that would traditionally be involved in greenlighting any major renovations at the White House, according to a person familiar with the matter.

But the White House is ultimately exempt from their binding authority and approval process, the person said, because of what a symbolically unique property 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. is.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ballroom-construction-white-house-tours/

 

If Biden had gotten donors to pay for a new ballroom your MAGA boomer ass wouldve spammed these forums with 20 different NYPOST braindead OPeds.

 

Sad but true.

 

Lol at how comically big this thing is.

I have no words for this moronic behavior.

 

There are bigger problems than this -,it looks stupid because of the sheer size of it, the whole structure is thrown off … but whatever.