1. United States
2. Iowa
3. Letter

Oppose the White House Ballroom — The President Used Last Night's Incident to Defend a Project Built on Fabrications, and I Need You to Say So I am one of your constituents, and I need to talk to you about something that happened this morning that I cannot let go unanswered. Last night a law enforcement officer was injured at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. He survived and is expected to recover. The suspect was in custody. The investigation had not been open for twelve hours. And before any of that was fully sorted out — before we even knew why the suspect did what he did — the President of the United States was on Truth Social using last night's incident to demand that legal challenges to his $400 million ballroom be dropped. I have been following this ballroom project for months. I have watched the cost double from $200 million to $400 million in five months. I have watched a historic wing of the White House get demolished before the proper permits were obtained. I have watched corporations with billions of dollars in government contracts write checks to fund a project that benefits the president who oversees those contracts. And I have watched the President claim over and over again that every president for 150 years demanded this ballroom be built. That last claim — the one he made again this morning — is a lie. And I need you to say so publicly, because Congress's own researchers already proved it. Congressman Steve Cohen asked the Congressional Research Service — the nonpartisan, fact-finding arm of Congress itself — to look into whether previous presidents had actually sought a White House ballroom. The answer came back clearly: no previous president had sought to build one. Not one. In 150 years. There are no archival records, no presidential memoirs, no White House documents showing any previous president demanded this structure. The Congressional Research Service said so directly. What the record actually shows is that every president before Trump hosted formal events in the East Room, which seats 200 people, or in temporary tents on the grounds that cost about $1 million per event. President Biden held four of his six state dinners in tents. Nobody thought this was a crisis. Nobody was demanding a $400 million permanent solution. The "150 years of presidents demanding this" line was invented to justify a decision that was already made — and the nonpartisan research arm of Congress has now confirmed that. I need you to say that publicly. Not in a press release buried on your website. Out loud, where your constituents can hear it. Now let me tell you why this morning's argument about last night's incident is just as false. The President claimed that what happened last night "would never have happened" with his ballroom under construction. I want you to think about that claim for one moment — because it falls apart immediately. The dinner was at the Washington Hilton. It is always at the Washington Hilton. Nobody has proposed moving it to White House grounds. A ballroom built at the White House would not change the security situation at the Hilton. It would not have stopped a person from approaching a magnetometer checkpoint a mile away at a completely different building. The President is essentially arguing that a ballroom he is building at the White House would have prevented an incident at a hotel he never planned to use for this dinner. And this is not even a new argument. A federal judge already looked at the administration's pattern of using security claims to justify this project and called those arguments "incredible, if not disingenuous." The judge said explicitly that "national security is not a blank check to proceed with otherwise unlawful activity." This morning's Truth Social post is the same argument dressed up in last night's events. A real officer was injured. A real family had a terrifying night. And the President used that within hours to push back against a court order blocking his construction project. That is not something I can stay quiet about. And I do not think you should either. I also want you to know what is actually being built here — because what the public was told and what the President has now admitted are two different things. We were told this was a venue for state dinners. The President then acknowledged on the record, aboard Air Force One, holding the renderings himself, that the military is constructing a massive complex underneath the ballroom and that the ballroom itself is essentially a roof over what is being built underground. The taxpayer cost of that underground military installation has never been disclosed. Nobody voted on it. Nobody was asked about it. The public was told one thing and the President admitted another — and Congress has not demanded an accounting. On top of all of this, the people funding this project include Apple, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, Google, Lockheed Martin, and Palantir — every one of them with significant business before this administration. The White House hid additional donors including BlackRock and Nvidia. The chief ethics lawyer for the White House Counsel's Office under President George W. Bush — a Republican — said this arrangement crosses clear ethical lines and amounts to pay-to-play. And when the public was asked what they thought, 98 percent of the 32,000 people who commented told the National Capital Planning Commission they opposed it. Ninety-eight percent. I know you are busy. I know there are a lot of things competing for your attention right now. But I am asking you to do four specific things. Tell your constituents publicly that the "150 years" claim is false. The Congressional Research Service has done the work. You just have to say it out loud. Tell your constituents publicly that last night's incident does not justify this project. The argument does not hold together and you know it. Say so. Demand a full accounting of what this project actually costs — including the undisclosed cost of the underground military installation being paid for with public money. Demand the full donor list with amounts, so the American people can see exactly which corporations bought access to the president through this project and for how much. I am not asking you to take a huge political risk. I am asking you to correct two factual lies and do the basic oversight work that your office exists to do. Last night something frightening happened at a public event, and the President used it before the sun came up to push his construction project. Someone needs to stand up and say that is not acceptable. I hope that someone is you. I expect a real response within 14 days — not a form letter. I will be sharing whatever I hear, or do not hear, with my neighbors and my community.