Secrecy around White House security makes details scarce, but President Donald Trump’s legal fight over a reported $400 million ballroom has highlighted an underground bunker at the former East Wing site that has played a role in presidential history.
The bunker surfaced in litigation between the Trump administration and the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which is challenging construction of the 90,000-square-foot ballroom. A federal appeals court recently allowed the administration to continue the project, putting on hold a lower court order that blocked aboveground construction but exempted work to protect White House safety and security. The administration’s filings describe materials and work to create a “heavily fortified” facility, including bomb shelters, military installations and medical facilities under the ballroom.
The East Wing bunker traces to Franklin D. Roosevelt, when an underground bomb shelter was installed in 1942 after the U.S. entered World War II. Public detail is limited because of security concerns. Historian Garrett Graff says the Presidential Emergency Operations Center beneath the East Wing was designed for short-term use: to move the president from a known location to an unknown one for safety and continuity.
Notable uses include Vice President Dick Cheney being hurried to a bunker during the September 11, 2001 attacks; Cheney later recalled being grabbed by a Secret Service agent and led to the underground space. More recently, President Trump was moved to a White House bunker in 2020 during protests after George Floyd’s death, when chants and unrest near Lafayette Park raised security alarms.
The administration argues the aboveground ballroom is needed to protect and complete security-related underground structures. Matthew Quinn, deputy director of the Secret Service, told the court an above-ground slab and topping structure are necessary to properly protect and strengthen key underground facilities, and that leaving the site unfinished could imperil the Secret Service’s mission.
Trump has described security upgrades tied to the project: a drone-resistant roof, secure air-handling systems, bio-defense measures, secure communications, bomb shelters and medical facilities. He asserted the underground portion is “wedded to” the aboveground structure.
The National Trust contends Trump exceeded his authority by proceeding without approvals from federal agencies and Congress. U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled for the nonprofit in March, briefly allowing underground work to continue while blocking aboveground construction; the administration appealed. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has a hearing scheduled for June 5.
Taxpayers are expected to cover security elements of the project, though Trump has said donors will fund the ballroom itself. How the underground and aboveground elements are functionally tied remains contested and may be resolved by ongoing litigation.
