A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has blocked the Trump administration from closing the East Potomac Golf Course and the park that surrounds it for the next two weeks.
Biden-appointed U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes ruled on Saturday that the Interior Department could not fully close the course or park in line with the Trump administration’s planned Nov. 15 time frame for the beginning of President Donald Trump’s planned redesign of the course.
“East Potomac Golf Course shall remain open and accessible to the public, except for routine, temporary closures consistent with the Course’s historical operating practices, and except as needed to address articulated, imminent threats to public safety,” Reyes wrote in the opinion.
Reyes added that all other parts of East Potomac Park south of Buckeye Drive SW — which the Interior Department had planned to close, according to court filings — must remain open except for certain specific portions where active seawall restoration is necessary for public safety.
The temporary restraining order is the latest development in the legal saga between the DC Preservation League and the Trump administration over President Trump’s plans to reconstruct the course into a “championship-level golf course” designed by golf course designer Tom Fazio. Reyes has dealt a series of blows to Trump’s plan to redevelop the course.
“The Court has acknowledged that the National Park Service can limit access to its facilities where the public is at risk of harm,” the Department of Justice said in a statement Saturday night on Reyes’s order. “Nothing in the Court’s order precludes planning for the development of a world class golf course to continue. The Department of Justice will always vociferously defend the Trump Administration’s agenda in court.”
Reyes’s order blocks the Trump administration from moving forward with the planned renovations through Nov. 28.
JUDGE GRILLS TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ON SUDDEN UPCOMING CLOSURE OF EAST POTOMAC PARK
On Saturday, Trump announced that Washington, D.C., residents would get a 50% discount to play at the now-public course once it is renovated.
“Trash Island is currently the Worst Golf Course anywhere in the World,” Trump said of East Potomac Park, “but the Department of the Interior is going to make it into the Best Golf Course anywhere in the World.”