New Delhi, Oct. 24 -- A wing erased, a ballroom promised, and Washington's guardrails put to the test

Washington, DC - The sound that carried across the South Grounds this week was not ceremony but machinery, excavators chewing into brick and plaster as demolition crews finished tearing down the White House's East Wing. By Thursday evening, October 23, 2025, the familiar visitor entrance was a rubble field behind temporary fencing, the first phase of President Donald Trump's plan to add a sprawling new ballroom to the executive mansion. The spectacle unfolded against a season of dissent in the streets, including city-scale marches questioning presidential spectacle, and it has already become a test of how far a White House can go when th...