A federal appeals court ordered President Trump to stop construction on his White House ballroom project, ruling that he should have asked Congress for permission before razing the old East Wing and starting his new building.
The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia delayed the effective date for a couple of weeks to give the president a chance to appeal.
In a 2-1 decision, the court said the White House, a crown jewel of America’s government and a national park site, doesn’t belong to a single president and that the Constitution gives Congress the power to make major decisions about the property.
The court said Mr. Trump lacked authority to demolish the East Wing last year and to move forward with his $400 million, 90,000-square-foot ballroom.
“Whether or not a massive ballroom should be constructed is for Congress to decide and is not a matter for executive self-help,” wrote Judges Patricia Millett and Brad Garcia, both Democratic appointees.
The ruling upheld a lower court injunction.
Unless the full appeals court or the Supreme Court reverses it, the injunction will halt construction while the case develops more fully.
The ruling is a big setback for Mr. Trump, who has said he wants to leave the White House with a space to host major international events.
He has also cited safety and security. After a gunman tried to storm the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner last spring, he said a space inside the White House complex would have prevented that threat. He has also bragged about anti-drone technology that would be incorporated into the design he has delighted in showing off to reporters.
The project is mostly funded by private donations to the National Park Service.
Mr. Trump had sought $1 billion in a budget bill earlier this year, but Senate Republicans stripped the money from the legislation.
The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a private group, had sued to stop the ballroom. The trust said its members had standing to sue because if the project were completed, it would upset the “aesthetic” of the complex, with the ballroom dwarfing the main White House building.
Judge Neomi Rao, a Trump appointee who dissented from Friday’s ruling, called that a weak justification for the lawsuit. She said she would have ruled the trust lacked legal standing.
She also gave significant weight to the government officials who had said halting construction now would be a security issue. She said that should have outweighed the “aesthetic harm”
“The district court elevated the aesthetic displeasure of a single passerby over the government’s security interests in the ballroom and the security risks of leaving an open construction site at the president’s home and office,” she wrote.
Judge Rao also said presidents have long enjoyed freedom to make improvements to the White House residence.
She said the ballroom seems to fall under that category since it will be directly tied to the residence through the White House’s East Room.
And she found that the ballroom could be funded with private donations, alleviating Mr. Trump of the need to go to Congress for financial approval.
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