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Washington — The Department of the Interior is working on a plan to close East Potomac Golf Links in Washington, D.C., by Nov. 15 after President Trump twice said the historic course will temporarily shutter for a redesign next month, senior Justice Department officials said Wednesday.
In a brief filing with the U.S. district court, Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward acknowledged Mr. Trump’s declarations, shared to Truth Social, that East Potomac will close so it can be overhauled “for Competitive (with other such projects!), Safety, Modernization, and Aesthetic reasons.”
“Accordingly, Interior, acting through counsel, is working to develop a plan to implement that direction and will provide this Court with notice,” Woodward said.
The Trump administration has for months been involved in a legal fight — brought by a local preservation group and two golfers — over the potential overhaul of East Potomac, a public course in the nation’s capital that has been open since 1920.
While administration officials have said there is no finalized proposal to redesign and renovate the course, only a “possible project,” the president announced on Truth Social earlier this month that the Interior Department, led by Secretary Doug Burgum, and Tom Fazio, a golf-course architect, had “developed a plan to build a World Class Championship Golf Course” at East Potomac.
The president said the current course would close Nov. 15 to allow work on the new design to begin, and the revamped course would open in roughly 15 months.
Mr. Trump’s announcement came after U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, who is overseeing the challenge involving East Potomac, temporarily blocked the Trump administration from removing trees at the course after more than 500 were chopped down in the span of a weekend.
Reyes on Monday issued a longer-term order that continued to bar the government from “removing or damaging” any trees at the site while the litigation continues. The challengers had argued that the tree felling was part of the Trump administration’s plan for the new course, and the judge agreed.
Reyes wrote in her 70-page decision that “rarely, if ever, has the United States Department of Justice urged a federal court not to believe the sitting President,” after Woodward told the judge in a contentious court hearing earlier this month that despite Mr. Trump’s posts about an overhaul of East Potomac, there was “no plan to close the course.”
“This started as a case about golf. That good walk spoiled,” Reyes wrote, adding it “has become much more. It now forces the Court to reconcile assertions by President Donald J. Trump with the sworn testimony of multiple government employees and the argument of senior Department of Justice attorneys.”
The Justice Department has since appealed Reyes’ decision. The judge said a court hearing will be scheduled for Friday or Monday to address how the case should be handled in coming days.
The plaintiffs in the suit have not yet brought forward a motion asking Reyes to block the course closure and subsequent overhaul.
