President Donald Trump gestures as he speaks in the James Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House after a shooting incident outside the ballroom at the annual White House Correspondents' Association dinner in Washington, Saturday, April 25, 2026, as acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI director Kash Patel listen (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana).
In a motion that sounds like something written by President Donald Trump himself days after an unrelated security failure and attack at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, three top DOJ lawyers urged a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit blocking the construction of a ballroom where the East Wing used to be.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, and Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General R. Trent McCotter entered the case Monday with a nine-page filing for U.S. District Judge Richard Leon's consideration that used the words "FAKE," "TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME," and "DONALD J. TRUMP" in all caps, and referred to former President "Barack Hussein Obama."
Reading similarly to a Trump post on Truth Social, much like the DOJ's failed arguments in defense of his tariffs at the Supreme Court, the motion asserted that the George W. Bush-appointed judge must "immediately" issue a ruling to "dissolve the injunction, and put an end to this frivolous lawsuit, which greatly endangers the lives of all Presidents, current and future."
"'The National Trust for Historic Preservation' is a beautiful name, but even their name is FAKE because when they add the words 'in the United States' to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, it makes it sound like a Governmental Agency, which it is not," the filing began with mockery of the plaintiff organization's name. "In fact, the United States refused to continue funding it in 2005 because they strongly disagreed with their mission and objectives. They are very bad for our Country. They stop many projects that are worthy, and hurt many others."
The motion then took aim at Greg Craig — the former White House counsel to President Barack Obama who was once charged as part of Robert Mueller's investigation and then acquitted in 2019 of lying about Ukraine-related lobbying work — who filed the lawsuit on behalf of the group and its member Alison Hoagland. The DOJ criticized Craig for refusing to end the case even after the arrest of Cole Allen, the suspect accused of attempting to assassinate Trump at the Washington Hilton Hotel on Saturday night.
"They were asked by the United States Military not to bring this suit because of the Top Secret nature of the important facility being built. They were shown detailed plans and specifications of this knitted, unified, and cohesive structure by Top Officers and Leaders in both the Military and Secret Service. But this did not deter them because they suffer from Trump Derangement Syndrome, commonly referred to as TDS, as noted by Democrat Senator John Fetterman, of Pennsylvania, and are represented by the lawyer for Barack Hussein Obama, Gregory Craig," the Monday filing continued, claiming the shooting incident away from White House grounds was relevant to security on White House grounds.
"The lower section of the building does not work without the upper section and, likewise, the upper section of the building does not work without the lower. It is all one highly integrated unit! As an example, one venting system, one electrical system, one plumbing system, one security system, one air conditioning and heating system, one elevator connector and, very importantly, one structural steel and enforced concrete system and more. Even the bullet proof windows and glass, and the heavy steel, drone proof roof, protect what is below," the motion said. "With such a facility, it would have been impossible for an attack like that which took place last Saturday evening in D.C. when an attempted assassin, armed with a shotgun, pistol, and knives, charged through a security checkpoint at the Washington Hilton in an attempt to assassinate President Donald J. Trump, First Lady Melania Trump, and members of the President's Cabinet and senior staff, during the White House Correspondents' Dinner. The Secret Service fortunately neutralized the assassin before he could reach the ballroom."
From here, the DOJ suggested that the judge himself is putting Trump at risk, not mentioning who decided to knock down the East Wing and created these conditions in the first place.
"[E]very additional day of court-manufactured delay is yet another day that the lives of the President, his family, his Cabinet, and his staff, and those of future Presidents, are being subject to avoidable hazard," the filing added, stating that the ballroom "is free of charge to the American Taxpayer" and asking: "Who could ever object to that?"
On Sunday, Blanche posted a letter that DOJ assistant AG Brett Shumate sent Craig, calling the shooting proof that the ballroom is "essential" for the safety of the president, his family, and the members of his cabinet. The acting AG blasted Hoagland without naming her, for convincing Leon that the aesthetic injury of seeing the demolished East Wing one time per month gave her standing to sue.
"This lawsuit is on behalf of a single person who walks in the vicinity of the White House once a month and expects to dislike the East Wing's new design. The passing aesthetic gripe of a single person cannot possibly justify delaying the construction of a secure facility for the President to do his job," the acting AG said.
The motion reiterated Monday that there's "absolutely no argument that a woman walking her dog in the vicinity of the White House has STANDING to stop such a desperately needed structure[.]"
Trump posted screenshots of the motion on Truth Social without any comment, apparently letting it speak for him.
After Leon issued his injunction, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia forced him to issue a clarification about the scope of his order.
"Defendants argue that the entire ballroom construction project, from tip to tail, falls within the safety-and-security exception and therefore may proceed unabated. That is neither a reasonable nor a correct reading of my Order! My Order preliminarily enjoined Defendants (excluding the President) from 'taking any action in furtherance of the physical development of the proposed ballroom,'" Leon followed up on April 16. "The accompanying opinion stated that "the ballroom construction project must stop until Congress authorizes its completion.' It is, to say the least, incredible, if not disingenuous, that Defendants now argue that my Order does not stop ballroom construction because of the safety-and-security exception!"
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