White House East Wing will be torn down fully to make way for Trump ballroom, official says

Item 1 of 3 A demolition crew takes apart the facade of the East Wing of the White House, where U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposed ballroom is being built, in Washington, D.C., U.S., October 21, 2025. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

[1/3]A demolition crew takes apart the facade of the East Wing of the White House, where U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposed ballroom is being built, in Washington, D.C., U.S., October 21, 2025. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

WASHINGTON, Oct 22 (Reuters) – The full East Wing of the White House will be torn down as part of the process to build a new ballroom proposed by President Donald Trump, a White House official said on Wednesday.

“We can confirm that the entire East Wing is going to be modernized and renovated to, I guess, support the … ballroom project,” the official said.

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Demolition workers began tearing down the section of the White House that holds offices for the first lady and other staff on Monday. The official said the demolition process is likely to be finished within two weeks.

The action contradicts Trump’s promise earlier this year that the ballroom project, which he has wanted to build for some time, would not touch the existing East Wing structure.

The demolition of part of one of the most historical buildings in the United States has drawn criticism and sadness from Trump’s critics, including many Democrats. The White House has dismissed the criticism as “manufactured outrage.”

The White House said on Tuesday it would submit plans for the ballroom construction for review by the National Capital Planning Commission, which oversees federal construction in Washington and neighboring states, even though demolition had already begun.

Reporting by Jeff Mason
Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Diane Craft

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Jeff Mason is a White House Correspondent for Reuters. He has covered the presidencies of Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden and the presidential campaigns of Biden, Trump, Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain. He served as president of the White House Correspondents’ Association in 2016-2017, leading the press corps in advocating for press freedom in the early days of the Trump administration. His and the WHCA’s work was recognized with Deutsche Welle’s “Freedom of Speech Award.” Jeff has asked pointed questions of domestic and foreign leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un. He is a winner of the WHCA’s “Excellence in Presidential News Coverage Under Deadline Pressure” award and co-winner of the Association for Business Journalists’ “Breaking News” award. Jeff began his career in Frankfurt, Germany as a business reporter before being posted to Brussels, Belgium, where he covered the European Union. Jeff appears regularly on television and radio and teaches political journalism at Georgetown University. He is a graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism and a former Fulbright scholar.