Top Republicans on the Hill are quietly sweating over a White House push to attach $1 billion to fortify President Donald Trump’s planned East Wing ballroom.
Senior GOP lawmakers warn the demand, folded into a broader $72 billion immigration funding bill, could blow the whole package up amid the party’s already razor-thin House majority, according to Punchbowl News.
Republicans in both chambers are griping behind closed doors that the optics are radioactive, even though the administration and party leadership maintain the money will not go towards any actual construction on Trump’s pet vanity project.
“There is no way in hell that this will get 218 votes on the floor,” one official vented.
Under the bill, the funds would head to the Secret Service to bankroll “security adjustments and upgrades” tied to the East Wing Modernization Project, including hardening of “above-ground and below-ground security features.” That means a bunker under the ballroom.
A Senate Republican told Punchbowl the chasm between what Trump originally said the building would cost, about $400 million, and the eye-watering $1 billion that the Secret Service is now requesting is hard to swallow—especially since the administration has shared next to nothing about the project’s actual blueprints.
“A first-year poli sci major would know not to ask members to take this vote and we hope the speaker does too,” they said.
Sen. Susan Collins of Maine has demanded backers spell out “the case for why the proposed funding is necessary.” Moderates listed by PunchBowl as likely to bolt include Representatives. Brian Fitzpatrick, Nick LaLota, Don Bacon, Jen Kiggans, and Rob Bresnahan.
The White House is leaning hard on the April 25 assassination attempt at the Correspondents’ Dinner to justify the windfall, with White House spokesperson Davis Ingle praising the proposal and pointing to a memo signed by DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin alongside Secret Service chief Sean Curran defending the ask.
Senate Democrats are working to kill the request entirely. Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut has already framed the proposal as a “bait and switch,” arguing voters were sold a privately funded vanity project and are now being handed the bill.
The Daily Beast contacted the White House for comment on this story. “The White House applauds Congress’s latest proposal in its reconciliation package which includes additional funding for security infrastructure upgrades in relation to the long overdue East Wing Modernization Project,” spokesperson Davis Ingle said.
“Congress has rightly recognized the need for these funds,” he went on. “Due in part to the recent assassination attempt on President Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, the proposal would provide the United States Secret Service with the resources they need to fully and completely harden the White House complex, in addition to the many other critical missions for the USSS.”
“As President Trump has repeatedly said, the White House must be a safe and secure complex that generations of future presidents and visitors to the People’s house can enjoy,” he added.
