How the scope of Trump’s White House ballroom plans has expanded: From the Politics Desk

Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, a newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign trail.

In today’s edition, Kristen Welker takes stock of President Donald Trump’s demolition of the East Wing. Plus, I break down some troubling economic poll numbers for Trump and answer this week’s reader question on the president’s plan (or lack thereof) for Obamacare.

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— Adam Wollner

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How the scope of Trump’s White House ballroom plans has expanded

By Kristen Welker

It’s quite a scene: The East Wing of the White House has unexpectedly, and suddenly, been demolished as President Donald Trump plans to build a ballroom in its place, one that’s nearly double the size of the White House residence with a price tag of $300 million.

While Trump had telegraphed this decision for months — he gave me a tour of the ballrooms at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida that inspired the project after I interviewed him in May — the scope of the project is significantly larger than how he originally described it.

Back then, Trump told me that the ballroom would use “the meeting rooms already existing” and that the new construction would be “near the East Wing.”

“It will be something really beautiful, top of the line,” the president said.

As for the money, Trump told me at the time, “I’ll fund it, and I’m sure we’ll have some donations to it.”

Now that the shovels are in the ground, we’re getting a better look at the full scope — a project that isn’t “near” the East Wing, but that apparently requires demolishing the entire East Wing and almost all of the East Terrace, a White House official told NBC News this week. The price tag has ballooned from $200 million to $300 million, and the donors — in addition to the president — include a number of major corporations (including Comcast Corp., the parent company of NBCUniversal).

As the size, scope and cost of the project is growing, so is the scrutiny. The National Trust for Historic Preservation is urging demolition be paused so the project can go through a legally required public review process. The White House is arguing it only needs approval for construction, not demolition.

Democrats have been pillorying Trump over the project, arguing it’s a waste of money and a bad message to send during a government shutdown that’s now lasted 24 days. At least one Republican, retiring Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, made the same argument to NBC News’ Capitol Hill team this week.

“We’re talking about building a ballroom when we’re trying to get the economy squared away. The timing’s bad,” he said.

This Sunday on “Meet the Press,” I’ll speak with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz. I hope you’ll join us.

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Trump’s economic rating takes a hit as inflation persists

Analysis by Adam Wollner

Today brought the first major economic report the government has issued since the shutdown began.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that inflation hit 3% on an annual basis in September, slightly up from 2.9% in August. The findings underscore that stubbornly high prices are continuing to put pressure on Americans. As our colleagues Steve Kopack and Rob Wile note, it comes as the job market appears frozen in place and as overall consumer sentiment is down.

It also occurs against the backdrop of President Donald Trump’s ongoing trade wars. Overnight, he said he was terminating trade talks with Canada, accusing the country of trying to interfere with an upcoming Supreme Court case about the legality of his “reciprocal” tariffs.

It all appears to be having an impact on how the public views Trump’s handling of an issue that was key to his 2024 victory: the economy.

His approval rating on the economy was well underwater — and lagged behind his overall job approval rating — in five independent, nonpartisan polls released by media organizations and universities over the past week. In four of those polls, Trump’s economic approval rating was below 40%.

Trump’s low marks were of particular note in two of the recent polls. A CNBC All-America Economic Survey found that 42% of adults approved of the president’s performance on the economy, while 55% disapproved. The net -13 approval was the lowest number on the economy in CNBC’s poll through either of Trump’s two terms.

Similarly, a Quinnipiac University poll showed that 38% of registered voters gave Trump a positive rating on the economy, compared with 57% who gave a negative one. That was the lowest score Quinnipiac had tracked since February 2017, during Trump’s first full month in office.

As Allan Smith, Sahil Kapur and Shannon Pettypiece recently reported, Democrats are eager to use the issue to their advantage after it sunk them in the last election. Exit polls from 2024 found that 81% of voters who rated the economy as their top issue supported Trump.

Despite these new poll numbers for Trump, Democrats still have their work cut out for them to prove they would be better stewards of the economy. The recent AP-NORC poll found that 36% of adults said they trust the Republicans more to handle the economy, while 25% said the Democrats. (Another 12% said they trust both equally, and 26% said they trust neither.)

Still, if these sorts of economic approval ratings persist for Trump — who had promised to lower prices “starting on Day 1” — it could cause problems for his party as next year’s midterm elections approach.

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✉️ Mailbag: Trump’s health care plans

Thanks to everyone who wrote in! Here’s this week’s reader question:

“Does the president have a plan to replace Obamacare or still just a concept of a plan?”

The reader is referring to a comment Donald Trump made during a presidential debate against Kamala Harris last year, when he said he had “concepts of a plan” to replace the Affordable Care Act.

“We are working on things. We’re going to do it. We’re going to replace it,” Trump said during the September 2024 event. “We’re looking at different plans. If we can come up with a plan that is going to cost our people, our population less money and be better than Obamacare, then I would absolutely do it.”

Dating back to his first term, Trump has long pledged to repeal and replace the ACA. Now, more than a year after those debate comments, he and his administration have yet to outline the specifics of a plan to do so.

Most recently, Dr. Mehmet Oz, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, was pressed on this issue on “Meet the Press NOW” on Wednesday. He suggested Trump had a plan, but did not offer any details.

“I fully believe the president has a plan,” Oz told Kristen Welker. “We’ve been talking about it quite a bit. There’s all kinds of ideas.”

“The issue, Kristen, is which specific parts of the plan do you prioritize, which are the ones you want to focus on,” he added.

While Obamacare was once a more consistent punching bag for Republicans, the politics of the issue have shifted. The latest Economist/YouGov poll, for instance, found that 60% of Americans approve of the ACA, while just 30% disapprove.

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That’s all From the Politics Desk for now. Today’s newsletter was compiled by Adam Wollner and Owen Auston-Babcock.

If you have feedback — likes or dislikes — email us at politicsnewsletter@nbcuni.com

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