The Ballroom to Save America
As reporters on Saturday night were waiting for President Donald Trump to give a press conference from the briefing room following the White House Correspondents’ Dinner attack, a unified message began percolating online among elected Republicans and other influential right-wingers: This is why we need the ballroom.
And once the press briefing got underway, Trump made his pitch: “I didn’t want to say this, but this is why we have to have all of the attributes of what we’re planning at the White House,” he said. “It’s actually a larger room and it’s a much more secure — it’s got — it’s drone proof. It’s bulletproof glass.”
As the week begins, congressional Republicans are trying really, really hard to sell the White House ballroom as a “solution” to rising political violence and the everyday occurrence of gun violence.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) — who was present at the Saturday night dinner and was quickly evacuated — spent Monday morning on Fox News acting as the marketing team for the ballroom.
“The ballroom will be a solution for this because it’ll be on the most secure compound in the world,” Johnson said during an interview on Fox. “It won’t have hotel rooms above it and it’ll have seven-inch-thick glass, for example, on the windows so it’ll be a very safe environment to do events like this. We need a place … and the president keeps pointing it out.”
Trump began planning the construction of a large ballroom at the White House complex when he took office last year. Workers undertook the work of demolishing the East Wing of the building in October 2025 to start construction. The project has faced outrage and legal challenges. Earlier this month, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon issued an order halting construction and finding that, if Trump wants his ballroom, Congress will have to approve it.
“The President of the United States is the steward of the White House for future generations of First Families. He is not, however, the owner!” Leon wrote in the colorful, exclamation point-strewn ruling. “[B]allroom construction project must stop until Congress authorizes its completion,” he concluded.
In the wake of what the Department of Justice has said was an attempt on the president’s life, Republicans see the moment to do just that.
Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) chimed in on Monday, saying “a ballroom is imperative.”
Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) on Sunday said he is “filing the ‘Build the Ballroom Act’ to create explicit statutory authority for a White House Ballroom.” Meanwhile, Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) announced her team is working “to draft legislation ensuring the White House Ballroom is completed.”
“I don’t believe congressional approval is required for the project, but if it’ll keep activist judges on the sideline, so be it,” Boebert said in a Sunday social media post.
Across the Capitol building, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) — who at times can be a thorn in the side of the Republican agenda — said he would be “dropping a bill tomorrow.”
“Let’s build the Ballroom,” Paul said.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt went even a step further, saying the ballroom is necessary and “critical for our national security.”
“The White House ballroom project is not just a fun project for President Trump — like you will read in the media,” Leavitt said on Monday. “It is actually critical for our national security that a larger, secure building on this complex … is built to accommodate not only large amounts of guests, but also the president, the vice president, members of the Cabinet, the line of secession in this country should be able to gather freely in safety, without the fear of threats or political violence. And the White House ballroom will provide that.”
A stand-alone ballroom bill would likely need some support from Democrats in the Senate in order to pass it. But congressional Republicans are also reportedly discussing greenlighting the ballroom construction in their reconciliation bill, which would only require a simple majority vote in both chambers.
— Emine Yücel
The One Sentence That Sums Up The White House’s Hyperbolic Response To The WHCD Gunman
In the days since a gunman targeted the White House Correspondents Dinner on Saturday night, President Trump and his allies have used the incident to go after political rivals, college students, the media, and even late night television comedian Jimmy Kimmel. As we’ve noted, Trump has also argued the attempted shooting shows why he needs his controversial White House ballroom.
The suspected gunman, who was charged with multiple accounts on Monday including attempted assassination of the president, allegedly distributed an anti-Trump manifesto to family members prior to the incident where he described the president as “a pedophile, rapist, and traitor.” Because of this, the White House has attempted to cast the incident — and a larger violent climate — as a result of opposition to the president.
Of course, that effort to politicize the incident ignores Trump’s own heated rhetoric and the many incidents of right-wing violence in recent years. And the effort to connect the gunman to the need for the ballroom does not address the fact the new space would likely not accommodate the annual dinner or the many serious questions about how that project is being built and financed.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt emphasized both the criticism of the president’s opponents and the ballroom pitch in her briefing on Monday. And her remarks included one comment that underscored just how exaggerated the Trump administration’s hyperpoliticized response to the shooting has been.
“Nobody in recent years has faced more bullets and more violence than President Trump,” Leavitt said.
While Trump has indeed dealt with other assassination attempts, the idea he has been under fire more than any other person would almost certainly be news to troops in warzones or victims of the mass shootings that have become such a regular feature of American life. Later on in the briefing, Leavitt also said Trump has dealt with “unprecedented adversity and challenges” as she used this hyped up depiction of victimhood to blast his rivals.
“This political violence stems from a systemic demonization of him and his supporters by commentators, yes, by elected members of the Democrat Party and even some in the media,” Leavitt said. “This hateful, and constant, and violent rhetoric directed at President Trump day after day after day for 11 years has helped to legitimize this violence and bring us to this dark moment.”
Leavitt specifically cited people who describe Trump as a “fascist” and a “threat to democracy.” Rather than acknowledging these are legitimate critiques provoked by the president’s own behavior, Leavitt described the characterizations as the product of a “left-wing cult of hatred against the president.”
In addition to inspiring a ballroom pitch and a new line of attack against his critics, the incident at the dinner has pushed the White House to review security measures. Leavitt said officials would be meeting to discuss protocols some time this week. As she discussed those plans, Leavitt made one more comment that was, perhaps, unintentionally revelatory and provided a window into the administration’s true focus: It’s all about Trump and his needs.
“The American people should be assured there is no higher priority for the president and his staff than the president’s safety,” Leavitt said.
— Hunter Walker
More Details on What Happened
The alleged White House Correspondents’ Dinner gunman, Cole Tomas Allen, was charged with three counts during an arraignment Monday: one count of attempting to assassinate the president, and two federal gun crimes — transporting a firearm and ammunition with intent to commit a felony, and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence.
An affidavit written by a federal law enforcement officer and released Monday afternoon provides an official account of what unfolded at the security perimeter Saturday night.
At approximately 8:40 p.m., ALLEN approached a security checkpoint on the
Terrace Level of the hotel leading to the location of the dinner. ALLEN approached and ran through the magnetometer holding a long gun. As he did so, U.S. Secret Service personnel assigned to the checkpoint heard a loud gunshot. U.S. Secret Service Officer V.G. was shot once in the chest; Officer V.G. was wearing a ballistic vest at the time.Officer V.G. drew his service weapon and fired multiple times at ALLEN, who fell
to the ground and suffered minor injuries but was not shot. ALLEN was subsequently arrested.At the time of his arrest, ALLEN was in possession of a 12-gauge pump action
shotgun and a Rock Island Armory 1911 .38 caliber pistol on his person.
The affidavit included a note that you may have seen published online Sunday and which law enforcement says Allen sent to his family minutes before the attack. It was emailed in a .txt file, the affidavit says, and explains the attack and it’s goals in a strikingly casual tone.
The affidavit did not, however, include the note in full:
— John Light
In Case You Missed It
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Rough Edges column: What’s Really Underpinning the ‘Missing Scientists’ Conspiracy Theory
Morning Memo: Judge Skeptical of Corrupt IRS Settlement with Trump
Layla A. Jones and Emine Yücel: Tillis Ends Blockade of Trump’s Fed Chair Nom After DOJ Drops Powell Investigation
Yesterday’s Most Read Story
Suspect in Custody Following Shooting At White House Correspondents’ Dinner
What We Are Reading
Sergey Brin Moves to the Right, With a ‘MAGA Girlfriend’ by His Side — Theodore Schleifer and Kate Conger, New York Times
We Are Bombarding America’s Forests With Roundup — Nate Halverson, Mother Jones
RFK Jr. & White House Appear At Odds Over Attempts To Rein Him In — Timothy Geigner, TechDirt
Beijing Is Using Influencers to Burnish Its Image: “Chinamaxxing” has become an online phenomenon. — Cooper Lund, Foreign Policy
A man that insists he is not a pedophile also insists that America provide him a ballroom.
Citizens elected him and Republicans still line up to agree with him.
Surprise, surprise. The first business day after the President inappropriately promoted the ballroom in the aftermath of the shooting at the press gathering, the sycophantic Republicans in the House have jumped to attention and expressed their support for it.
Seven inch dense windows match the dense Republican mind. Last week’s shooter was on the INSIDE, you dolt! A new Democratic administration will be planning a ballroom remodel to multiple lavish offices named after distinguished Democrats.
Please confirm that ‘line of secession’ was a monumental Freudian slip, not just a typo?
Just like the Jr. Bush’s invasion of Iraq was the solution 9-11.
Even Trumpees understand that “the ballroom” for Trump is at best a vanity project and has nothing to do with security or anything else other than Donald Trump’s ego.
The ballroom is also unpopular. So I suppose if going into the midterms this is a gift congressional Republicans want to give Trump, I guess in a way someone, Republican’s in the House and the Senate, will be paying for Trump’s vanity project.