Trump seeks congressional protection for his redesigned Oval Office

President Donald Trump has signed a proclamation intended to prevent future administrations from substantially altering the Oval Office and Cabinet Room, making the preservation of his redesigned White House interiors his first official action after Republicans’ sweeping midterm defeat. Trump said the proclamation would designate the two rooms as national monuments and require congressional approval for major modifications. He offered no detailed legal explanation of how the measure would operate.

The South China Morning Post noted that proclamations can themselves be reversed, citing Trump’s own record of rolling back national monuments. The president signed the document at the Resolute Desk with a red baseball cap marked “VETO” beside him. He said the rooms should not be dismantled or rebuilt by a future president and described the Oval Office as a symbol comparable to the White House itself.

Trump said that if anyone tried to knock down walls, he would return to ensure that the changes were not made. The move follows a series of highly visible White House projects during Trump’s return to office. He has filled the Oval Office with gold-coloured details, additional portraits and a copy of the Declaration of Independence.

The report also says he has overseen design changes in other rooms and is supervising construction of an elaborate ballroom. Trump’s focus on these projects has continued despite the political shock of Tuesday’s elections, in which Democrats took control of Congress. On Wednesday, he spoke to reporters while signing the final beam for the ballroom.

Earlier in the week, he visited the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to discuss renovation of that landmark. The president did not specify what future threat he believed the Oval Office faced or identify a successor who might seek to reverse his work. The report said his administration’s Washington beautification projects have faced lawsuits alleging that they were undertaken without required approval.

It did not report a court ruling on those claims. The proclamation is also being issued as Democrats prepare to scrutinise the administration. Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal, the senior Democrat on the Homeland Security Committee’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, sent letters to donors to Trump’s ballroom demanding information.

He warned that other measures could be used to obtain compliance. The timing and symbolism of the action distinguish it from a conventional response to the midterm results. Rather than announcing changes to policy or personnel, Trump used his first post-election official act to seek protection for physical alterations to the White House.

Whether Congress will accept the proposed restriction, and whether a future president could undo it, remains unresolved in the supplied reports.