Dan Diamond

The east wing of the White House had already been torn down.

The construction crews were on site starting to build the ballroom.

And the National Trust said, none of this is okay.

There should not be a precedent where the U.S.

president just tears down parts of the White House and starts rebuilding it without some oversight, without Congress getting to weigh in, without the public getting to comment.

And a federal judge essentially agreed with them after some back and forth.

The federal judge ordered that

the ballroom construction be halted.

He said if there was national security work that needed to be done, if there was a top secret bunker, for instance, which we kind of know exists, if that needs to be worked on, that's okay.

But the big ballroom that President Trump wants, that, the judge said, cannot move forward until Congress gives its okay.

Now, there is another court here in America, an appeals court, that has put that order on pause.

But either way, that legal challenge is probably the last big hurdle

outside of the logistical ones, facing this ballroom.

If that legal challenge fails, the president will get his ballroom.

And if the legal challenge succeeds, it's a real question about what gets built in the big hole next to the White House.

Absolutely.

We don't know how much each of these investors has given.

We know some of them.

And in some cases, it appears they may have gotten, if not access to Donald Trump, they may have gotten time to argue their policies.

It's possible some of them have gotten beneficial policies.