Part of the East Wing of the White House is demolished during construction of the new White House ballroom addition, Tuesday, October 21, 2025, in Washington, DC, USA.
Aaron Schertz | Bloomberg | Getty Images
The White House plans to demolish the entire East Wing to make room for a new ballroom being built at President Donald Trump’s order, a senior administration official told The New York Times on Wednesday.
Officials told the Times that demolition work should be completed by the end of this week.
This week, images showing the demolition of part of the east wing sparked public outrage. The demolition raises questions about who will pay for the planned $250 million, 90,000-square-foot building.
tech giant alphabet is donating $22 million to help build a White House ballroom under a legal settlement reached last month with Trump over the January 6, 2021, riot by his supporters at the U.S. Capitol, which resulted in Trump being banned from its YouTube platform.
Google’s parent company Alphabet’s contribution to the settlement, recorded in federal court in Oakland, California, represents nearly 10% of the estimated construction cost.
The settlement states that $22 million will be donated on behalf of President Trump to the “National Mall Trust, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization dedicated to the restoration, preservation, and elevation of the National Mall to support the construction of the White House State Ballroom.”
President Trump promised in July that the structure of the east wing would not be altered to make way for the ballroom, but he insists that U.S. taxpayers will not pay for the ballroom.
President Trump said he and private donors would pay for it.
“The White House Ballroom is privately funded by many generous patriots, great American businesses, and truly your money,” the president said in a post on his social media platform Truth Social on Monday.
Demolition workers tear down the facade of the East Wing of the White House, where U.S. President Donald Trump’s planned banquet hall is currently under construction, in Washington, DC, on October 21, 2025.
Jonathan Ernst | Reuters
However, it is still unclear who all the other donors are and how much they agreed to pay for the construction of the ballroom. lockheed martin confirmed to CNBC that it was donating to the project, but declined to say how much.
“Lockheed Martin is grateful for the opportunity to realize the President’s vision and add this building to the House of Peoples, a powerful symbol of the American ideals we strive to uphold every day,” a company spokesperson said.
Sources told CBS News in September: RJ Reynolds, booze allen hamilton, Palantir and NextEra Energy have also donated. CNBC has reached out to these companies for comment.
Mr. Trump selected McCreary Architects to design the ballroom. The construction team is being led by Clark Construction, and the engineering team is being led by AECOM, according to a July White House statement.
President Trump promised in July that construction of the banquet hall would “not interfere with the current building.”
“It’s close, but it’s not touching, and it’s completely respectful of the existing building. That’s what I’m the biggest fan of,” Trump said at the time of the East Tower.
The Treasury Department has prohibited its staff from sharing photos of the East Wing, saying it could pose a potential safety risk. This department is located next to the White House and has a good view of the demolition work.
The White House dismissed the outrage as a “manufactured outrage.”
comcastCNBC’s current parent company was on the list of top donors to Ballroom. It’s unclear how much Comcast is contributing. CNBC will be spun off from Comcast by the end of this year under a new parent company, Versant.
