White House East Wing demolition nearly complete to make room for Trump ballroom
Work continues on a largely demolished section of the East Wing of the White House ahead of construction of a new ballroom Thursday, October 23, 2025, in Washington.
Jacquelyn Martin | access point
Demolition of the White House East Wing is nearly complete as President Donald Trump moves forward with plans to build a massive ballroom, an administration official told NBC News on Thursday.
Construction crews are now turning their attention to debris removal, the official said. Photos show the building largely reduced to rubble.
Trump said Wednesday that the 90,000-square-foot ballroom will cost $300 million, higher than the original estimated price tag of $200 million.
The president promised in July that the ballroom would not impact the East Wing.
Atop the U.S. Treasury, lower right, construction workers watch as work continues on a largely demolished section of the East Wing of the White House ahead of construction of a new ballroom Thursday, Oct. 23, 2025, in Washington.
Jacquelyn Martin | access point
Trump said at the time: “He will stand by it, but he will not touch it, and he will fully respect the existing building, which I am the biggest fan of.”
When asked about the demolition on Wednesday, Trump said the East Wing was “too small” and that he “never thought it would be big.”
“In order to do this properly, we had to tear down the existing structure,” the president told reporters.
A senior White House official stated when asked by CNBC on Wednesday that the decision to demolish the East Wing was due to “structural reasons.”
Trump said the construction would be financed with his own funds and by private corporate donors at no cost to taxpayers. There are also technology giants among donors Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft And Meta.
The White House released the following list of corporate and individual donors:
- Altria Group Inc.
- Amazon
- Apple
- Booz Allen Hamilton Inc.
- Caterpillar Inc.
- coinbase
- Comcast Company
- J. Pepe and Emilia Fanjul
- Hard Rock International
- HP Inc.
- LockheedMartin
- Meta Platforms
- Micron Technology
- Microsoft
- NextEra Enerji A.Ş.
- Palantir Technologies Inc.
- Fluctuation
- Reynolds is American
- T-Mobile
- connect america
- Union Pacific Railroad
- Adelson Family Foundation
- Stefan E. Brodie
- Betty Wold Johnson Foundation
- Charles and Marissa Cascarilla
- Edward and Shari Glazer
- Harold Hamm
- Benjamin Leon Jr.
- Lutnick Family
- Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Foundation
- Stephen A. Schwarzmann
- Konstantin Sokolov
- Kelly Loeffler and Jeff Sprecher
- Paolo Tiramani
- Cameron Winklevoss
- Tyler Winklevoss
