By Rita Cook
Correspondent
Texas Metro News
WASHIGTON D.C. – How Much Power Does a President Have?
Apparently, we’re going to find out over a ballroom.
Remember that old saying: How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
Well, Washington has its own version this week:
How much power does a president have if Congress says he can’t build a ballroom?
And that, my friends, is the question now sitting just at the intersection of the White House, Congress and the courts.
A federal appeals court ruled Friday that President Donald Trump cannot continue construction of his proposed $400 million, 90,000-square-foot White House ballroom without congressional approval. The 2-1 decision puts the brakes on above-ground construction and sets up what could be a Supreme Court showdown.
No surprise, Trump is not taking this most recent chess move quietly.
He believes the ruling is wrong and has said he will appeal to the Supreme Court.
His argument is that the ballroom is being privately funded and is necessary for presidential security and large diplomatic events.
The president has said the project will be “the finest ballroom” ever and has even debated that presidents in the past have wanted a larger event space at the White House too,
Enter Congress with its various pro/con outlooks.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson is for it as is Republican Senator Rand Paul. Paul has argued that congressional authorization can resolve the legal dispute without turning the project into another taxpayer expense.
Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren is against it, but Democrat John Fetterman is in support despite his party’s broader opposition noting that after the shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner the Washington Hilton wasn’t designed to accommodate an event involving the presidential line of succession.
Warren on the other hand called the ballroom a “giant slap in the face to American families,”
And now the ballroom has become a constitutional argument.
But perhaps the ballroom isn’t really the story.
Power is.
After all, the appeals court’s majority made that clear.
The judges said the question isn’t whether the ballroom is attractive, useful or even desirable. The question is whether the president can fundamentally alter the White House complex without Congress.
Their answer was no.
The court described each president as a “temporary tenant, not the owner” of the White House.
Trump has said past presidents have built and altered portions of the White House before and that this project is privately funded.
So now we head to the Supreme Court.
And that is where this gets interesting.
Because whether you love Donald Trump, dislike Donald Trump or simply wish Washington would talk about something other than Donald Trump for five minutes, this question belongs to all of us:
How much power does a president have?
Can the president reshape the White House because he is the president?
Does Congress have to approve major changes to a property belonging to the American people?
And when the president and Congress disagree, how much should the courts get involved?
Those are the bigger questions than if Washington needs another ballroom.
So, yes, we’re apparently going to find out just how much wood a woodchuck can chuck.
Only in Washington, the woodchuck is the president, the wood is executive power, and Congress is standing there saying:
Not so fast. And now the Supreme Court may get the final say.
Rita Cook is a world traveler and writer/editor who specializes in writing on travel, auto, crime and politics. A correspondent for Texas Metro News, she has published 11 books and has also produced low-budget films.
