When the White House ballroom was hit with a legal challenge in December, Donald Trump’s defense of his pet project shifted from “I need a place to throw lavish parties” to “the White House needs a military complex, complete with an underground medical facility and rooftop drone port, and every day we go without one is a national security risk.”
But it turns out the safety threat is coming from inside the White House.
The Washington Post reports that original ballroom architect James McCrery II resigned last year after Trump kept pushing design features that violated safety codes. And these weren’t minor burdensome regulations, like stipulations on the exact size of the restrooms (though one early design did feature just seven women’s stalls for 650-plus guests). We’re talking about design features meant to keep everyone alive in an emergency:
Trump’s growing vision for the ballroom triggered a cascade of design issues, including conflicts with building standards McCrery was trained to follow, according to the people familiar with their discussions.
McCrery informed the White House that Trump’s ballroom design did not meet fire safety codes, which require the majority of guests to ...