--- title: Part of White House Demolished in Trump Ballroom Construction description: Demolition is underway on the East Wing of the White House as construction has begun on Trump's planned $250 million ballroom. canonical: https://time.com/7327200/trump-white-house-ballroom-east-wing-demolition/ author: Connor Greene article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2025-10-20T22:12:47.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-19T08:12:18.824Z article:section: Politics og:title: Part of White House Demolished in Trump Ballroom Construction og:description: Demolition is underway on the White House East Wing as construction has begun on Trump's planned $250 million ballroom. og:url: https://time.com/7327200/trump-white-house-ballroom-east-wing-demolition/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcbe861a5842517b6/6998caeac8dcb458c6b50958/GettyImages-2242250006.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: White House East Room Demolition Begins For Trump Ballroom Construction og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Part of White House Demolished in Trump Ballroom Construction twitter:description: Demolition is underway on the White House East Wing as construction has begun on Trump's planned $250 million ballroom. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcbe861a5842517b6/6998caeac8dcb458c6b50958/GettyImages-2242250006.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Part of the White House Is Being Demolished as Construction of Trump’s Ballroom Begins > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=fd541fb3-617e-4b49-9cc2-1abec28582e6&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Part of the White House Is Being Demolished as Construction of Trump’s Ballroom Begins [Watch (HLS stream): Part of the White House Is Being Demolished as Construction of Trump’s Ballroom Begins](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/RvhZM6Lv.m3u8) (1:46)  _Published 2025-10-23. The construction of President Donald Trump’s planned $250 million White House ballroom has officially begun, and it appears to involve the demolition of part of the East Wing._ by [Connor Greene](https://time.com/author/connor-greene/) ## Connor Greene Reporter Oct 20, 2025 10:12 PM UTC by [Connor Greene](https://time.com/author/connor-greene/) ## Connor Greene Reporter Oct 20, 2025 10:12 PM UTC The construction of President Donald Trump’s planned $250 million White House [ballroom](https://time.com/7326081/trump-president-arch-washington-project-construction/) has officially begun, and it appears to involve the demolition of part of the East Wing. Trump confirmed in a [speech](https://x.com/acyn/status/1980371634336014767?s=46) on Monday that construction had “just started” on the ballroom. The same day, photos and [video](https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/20/politics/white-house-east-wing-ballroom-construction) surfaced that showed demolition underway on the East Wing. [The Washington _Post_](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/10/20/white-house-begins-demolishing-east-wing-facade-build-trumps-ballroom/) first reported on the activity. When announcing the ballroom’s coming construction in July, the White House [said](https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/2025/07/the-white-house-announces-white-house-ballroom-construction-to-begin/) that it would be “where the small, heavily changed, and reconstructed East Wing currently sits,” though it said the “White House Ballroom will be substantially separated from the main building of the White House.” Trump himself previously said that the 90,000 square foot expansion wouldn’t “interfere with the current building.” “It’ll be near it but not touching it—and pays total respect to the existing building, which I’m the biggest fan of. It’s my favorite. It’s my favorite place. I love it,” Trump said at an Executive Order signing in July. On Monday, Trump characterized the East Wing as “completely separate from the White House itself.” “The East Wing is being fully modernized as part of this process, and will be more beautiful than ever when it is complete!” the President [wrote](https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/115408594704490513) on Truth Social. The Administration has not responded to TIME’s request for further details on the construction of the ballroom. The President said earlier in the day that the space would fit 999 people, substantially more than the capacity of the East Room. The expansion itself could nearly double the size of the existing structure. Last week, Trump welcomed nearly 130 donors and allies to celebrate their pledged contributions to the ballroom. Among the companies [represented](https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/trump-ballroom-donors-white-house-dinner-ccba9448?gaa%5Fat=eafs&gaa%5Fn=AWEtsqebyo7zIlo1JmLnrftN5ea-039Lz3X2ulnwDFi7YcYuJGXIm8vlBeV%5FgSIb5fk%3D&gaa%5Fts=68f6a43f&gaa%5Fsig=0z8OqlSezrUho1bYYX-p%5F0eMjndpr3nfOCCArJsXNhW73Sd329BiGiXRvIbmorePtQN%5F379pjlRXJYBo%5FvsvJQ%3D%3D) at the dinner, according to a White House official, were Amazon, Coinbase, Google and T-Mobile. The White House stated in its July announcement that the East Wing was constructed in 1902 and has been renovated many times, with its second story being added in 1942\. It also said that McCrery Architects would lead the design and Clark Construction the building of the ballroom, which the White House noted is “expected to be completed long before the end of President Trump’s term.” In August, Trump renovated the White House Rose Garden, [adding](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/08/07/rose-garden-mar-a-lago-yellow-umbrellas-trump/85558707007/) white and yellow-striped umbrellas like those at his Mar-a-Lago private club in Palm Beach, Florida. Trump has said he offered to construct a ballroom in the past during the Obama and Biden Administrations, but both declined. “We’ll have the most beautiful ballroom in the country,” Trump said on Monday. ## Transcript We determined that after really a tremendous amount of study with some of the best architects in the world, we determined that really knocking it down, trying to use a little section, you know, the East wing was not much. It was not much left from the original. It was over the course of 100 years it was changed, the columns were removed, and it was a much different building than a story was added on. In 1948, 1949. There was a story added on which was not particularly nice, and the building was very, very much changed from what it was originally. It was never thought of as being much. It was a very small building. It's about $300 million. It's set to do many, many things, including meetings of foreign leaders, including the honoring of foreign leaders is an interior shot of the ballroom. I think there'll be nothing like it. And it's being paid for 100% by me and some friends of mine, donors to it. The government is paying absolutely nothing. We are using little sections of footings and various other things, but that's sort of irrelevant. In order to do it properly, we had to take down the existing structure. The way it was shown, it looked like we were touching the white House. We don't touch the white House. And that's a bridge. That last bridge going from the white House to the ballroom. I haven't been transparent. That's something I've shown. I've shown this to everybody that would listen. Third rate reporters didn't see it because they didn't. Look, you're a third rate reporter. Always have been. So third rate reporters didn't look. But anybody that asked these these pictures have been in newspapers. They've been all over the place. And, you know, we're very proud of it. It's gotten great reviews. It's gotten really great reviews. Mr. president. I think we've been more transparent than anybody's ever been. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/7327200/trump-white-house-ballroom-east-wing-demolition/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/7327200/trump-white-house-ballroom-east-wing-demolition/"},"headline":"Part of the White House Is Being Demolished as Construction of Trump’s Ballroom Begins","datePublished":"2025-10-20T22:12:47.000Z","dateModified":"2026-10-19T08:12:18.824Z","description":"Demolition is underway on the East Wing of the White House as construction has begun on Trump's planned $250 million ballroom.","url":"https://time.com/7327200/trump-white-house-ballroom-east-wing-demolition/","keywords":["Donald Trump","News Desk"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcbe861a5842517b6/6998caeac8dcb458c6b50958/GettyImages-2242250006.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Connor Greene","jobTitle":"Reporter","url":"https://time.com/author/connor-greene/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcbe861a5842517b6/6998caeac8dcb458c6b50958/GettyImages-2242250006.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"White House East Room Demolition Begins For Trump Ballroom Construction","caption":"White House East Room Demolition Begins For Trump Ballroom Construction","creditText":"Kevin Dietsch—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/7327200/trump-white-house-ballroom-east-wing-demolition/","name":"Part of the White House Is Being Demolished as Construction of Trump’s Ballroom Begins"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Part of the White House Is Being Demolished as Construction of Trump’s Ballroom Begins","description":"The construction of President Donald Trump’s planned $250 million White House ballroom has officially begun, and it appears to involve the demolition of part of the East Wing.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/RvhZM6Lv/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2025-10-23T16:05:22.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/RvhZM6Lv.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/7327200/trump-white-house-ballroom-east-wing-demolition/","duration":"PT1M46S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/7327200/trump-white-house-ballroom-east-wing-demolition/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```