Senators from both parties are accusing President Donald Trump of secretly tapping government funds for his White House ballroom after Congress refused to write him a check.
The White House Office of Management and Budget quietly moved $352 million last week from a Secret Service fund — money the law restricts to personnel, training, programming, and technology — and labeled it "White House Security Measures."
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle suspect it is headed straight for the ballroom.
Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill, which supplied the cash, bars the use of those funds for construction. That has not stopped the suspicion from building.
"That's a big problem," Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) told NOTUS. "On its face it doesn't sound right."
"I don't know whether it's the ballroom, but it sounds like the ballroom," added Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI), a senior appropriator.
"I think there's been more and more credible coverage that President Trump was just flat out lying when he said the taxpayers will not pay a dime for his ballroom," Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) said. "I think he is now trying to find ways to funnel public money into it."
Trump spent more than a year insisting the project was "taxpayer-free."
As recently as March 31, he told reporters in the Oval Office, "We have no taxpayer putting up 10 cents" — weeks after The Washington Post reported that contractor Clark Construction had already handed the White House a $600 million cost estimate showing that more than half the tab would fall on the public.
Congress tried and failed to pass $1 billion in direct funding for ballroom security earlier this year. When that collapsed, the White House found a new pool of money — and an OMB official raised the ballroom unprompted when asked to explain the transfer.
Senators said they are demanding more details about exactly where the $352 million will go.
