US district judge Ana Reyes temporarily blocked the Trump administration from moving ahead with the Trump administration golf course renovation lawsuit, stopping a planned Sunday closure of East Potomac Park. She ordered the park near the Jefferson Memorial to remain open while the case continues.
In her 30-page decision, Reyes said the government’s stated reasons for closing the park were “pretextual” and that it had violated two federal laws to meet an arbitrary deadline. Donald Trump had said in an 18 October social media post that the closure would last 15 months and would turn the park’s golf offerings into “one of the Best and Most Spectacular Golf Courses anywhere in the World”.
Ana Reyes on East Potomac Park
Reyes wrote that “The government proposes to close a historic park, daily enjoyed by Washingtonians of all stripes, indefinitely”. She also said the government’s removal of hundreds of trees from the course and its failure to tell the preservation group about the work “has cost the government all of its credibility”.
The lawsuit was brought by the DC Preservation League, and Democracy Forward is representing the preservation league and two local residents. The judge earlier blocked the National Park Service from cutting down trees at the park or making other irreversible modifications without advance notice.
Catherine Carroll on the closure
Catherine Carroll, a senior legal adviser at Democracy Forward, called the plan “another one of the president’s vanity projects” and said, “The administration’s inexplicable drive to destroy East Potomac Park would have taken away a treasured park that could never be replaced.”
Reyes ordered that the park remain open, but she did not require the Trump administration to keep golf operations running at the site. The government also cannot use the absence of golf operations as a reason to exclude the public, leaving the park open to Washingtonians for now while the legal fight over the closure plan continues.
Washington park access
The ruling gives Washington residents and park users continued access to East Potomac Park near the Jefferson Memorial, about 2 miles south of the White House. Reyes has also ordered an ethics investigation into whether government lawyers repeatedly misled her about the timeline for the park’s closure, adding another layer to the dispute over what happens next in court.
