Members of the Commission of Fine Arts now fully stocked by President Donald Trump’s appointees lavished praise on his grand White House ballroom Thursday and gave the project two thumbs up.
Moving with unusual speed, six members of a key advisory panel approved in one fell swoop both the concept and the final plan after receiving an updated briefing on the project to build a $400 million ballroom in place of the East Wing abruptly torn down last year. The hearing wrapped up the commission’s review process, which normally would include a wait between conceptual and final approvals.
“The president has actually designed a very beautiful structure,” commission Chair Rodney Mims Cook Jr. declared, adding that “the United States just should not be entertaining the world in tents. It is really outrageous that we do that, and no president has really stepped up to the plate to require that be corrected, until President Trump.”
Historic preservationists have raised questions about the size of Trump’s ballroom, saying it would eclipse the main building of the White House. A federal judge considering a lawsuit by the National Trust for Historic Preservation last month also appeared willing to consider the group’s argument that the president had cut Congress out of the process required for such a major project.
