Former White House Historian Offers Dire Warning After Entire East Wing Is Demolished

Fifty years after the Declaration of Independence, Congress was already arguing about how much money to spend on what was then called the “President’s House,” because even in 1827, lawmakers couldn’t resist a good fight over budgets and optics.

Specifically, lawmakers argued about appropriations to finish and furnish the East Wing, or as Robert Letcher of Kentucky pointedly reminded his colleagues in 1827:

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“If you think fit to furnish the house, as it has been said, it is not his [Adams’] house: it is the People’s house; and, in whatever manner or style it is deemed proper to furnish it, it must be an affair of the least possible consequence to the President, individually.”

So yes, it turns out, “infrastructure week” has always been a nightmare.

That civic-minded restraint on the "People's House" didn’t exactly age well. The East Wing eventually became a permanent fixture under Theodore Roosevelt in 1902, first called the East Terrace, and was later rebuilt by Franklin D. Roosevelt to conceal a secret underground bunker.

Over time, it housed staff offices, a theater, ceremonial spaces, and the Jacqueline Kennedy Garden, a setting for countless first lady receptions.

As Jacqueline Kennedy once reminded the nation during her 1962 televised White House tour:

“The White House belongs to all Americans. It would be a pity to just let it fall into ruin.”

She treated the building not as a presidential perk but as a living museum of the country’s history—a philosophy that feels painfully at odds with a particular overly tanned someone’s gold-plated renovations.

Fast forward to the second term of the Trump administration, and unfortunately, “The People’s House” has accelerated to looking more and more like “a presidential palace” by the day.

At least that's what Edward Lengel, the former chief historian of the White House Historical Association, told CNN’s Erin Burnett:

“As a Founding Fathers historian, I’ve spent most of my life with George Washington. I think all of the founders would have been disgusted by this.”

And Lengel warned that the current renovations are only the beginning, with “more and more surprises down the road.”

Oh lawd, is the White House lawn about to host the next UFC main event?

The demolition marks a significant escalation from what Donald Trump promised just a few months ago.

On July 31, the former president had assured reporters:

“It won’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.”

Cue the bulldozers:

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Satellite imagery from Planet Labs PBC and on-the-ground photos taken Thursday show heaps of rubble where the East Wing once stood, after demolition began earlier this week. The New York Times first reported the scope of the teardown.

As excavators ripped through the structure, Trump confirmed Wednesday that he was indeed demolishing the entire East Wing to make way for his 90,000-square-foot ballroom—an expansion project that is already reshaping one of the nation’s most iconic landmarks.

Unmoved by the outrage, Trump shrugged off concerns. “It was never thought of as being much,” he said of the wing that once housed the first lady’s office. “It was a very small building.” The remark came during a July press conference on White House “beautification efforts,” where Trump outlined plans for a new ballroom adjacent to the East Wing.

According to two senior administration officials, the demolition could be finished by the weekend. Trump, ever the real-estate developer, boasted that he’d personally donate “millions” to fund the ballroom but declined to specify how many millions when asked.

Early estimates peg the cost of the Trump Ballroom between $850 million and $1 billion, according to construction consultants briefed on the plans. The expansive, marble- and gold-adorned venue is expected to include a 2,000-person dining hall, multiple crystal chandeliers, and a custom ceiling mural titled “Triumph of the Republic.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended the move, insisting the president doesn’t need formal approval for “demolition—only for vertical construction,” citing a convenient legal opinion from the National Capital Planning Commission. The agency, responsible for preserving Washington’s historic architecture, currently lacks the authority to intervene due to the ongoing government shutdown.

How convenient—while millions of Americans are struggling to put food on the table, the president is fast-tracking a billion-dollar vanity project complete with chandeliers and ego square footage.

Lengel fears the changes could reach far beyond the East Wing:

“Both in terms of the impact on the Executive Mansion itself. It could go beyond the East Wing; it could affect the Executive Mansion building itself, the original 1800 building. But I think much more likely what we’re going to see is a ballroom that’s even more ostentatious, and it’s going to turn the Executive Mansion into an annex to the party space.”

Channeling a Founding Fathers’ collective eye roll, you can watch the Engel and Burnett interview here:

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Social media lit up in outrage, with users pointing out the irony of a president expanding his ballroom during a government shutdown that’s left federal workers unpaid.

Meanwhile, Chelsea Clinton, whose mother famously restored and modernized the East Wing in the 1990s, condemned the demolition in a USA Today op-ed, framing it as yet another attack on democratic norms.

The former first daughter wrote:

“This is what happens when we take a wrecking ball to our heritage. Disregarding our democratic institutions and the rule of law or impounding funds that Congress has already approved grow from the same source of disregard for our founding ideals, and the norms and laws that have helped us move, over time, closer to a more perfect union, the cardinal call of our U.S. Constitution.”

You can read the rest of her op-ed here.

For now, the East Wing—once a symbol of civic service, family, and diplomacy—lies in pieces. If the Founding Fathers really are watching, they’re probably wishing they’d added a clause about “no ballroom expansions” to the Constitution.