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A contentious and surreal hearing that included presidential insults, a Constitutional debate and death threats ended just after 5 p.m. ET on Monday with the plight of a Washington, D.C. municipal golf course still unclear.
The hearing began at 10 a.m., although U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes didn’t allow public or media access to the proceedings until later in the afternoon. It included heated exchanges between Reyes and Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, who over the weekend filed a motion in the case to have Reyes removed as judge in the case because of her “bias” toward the administration of President Donald Trump.
Social media posts from Trump over the weekend and early Monday only added to the intense hearing.
East Potomac Golf Links has been at the center of a legal battle between the DC Preservation League and the Department of Interior since February and the litigation became particularly heated last week when the National Park Service removed “about 430 healthy, non-invasive trees” from the course despite previous warnings from Reyes for the government to provide notice “if anyone orders big things to show up [at the course].”
Those concerns only grew when Trump posted a rendition of a redesign plan for East Potomac, calling the existing course “old, broken, dilapidated, and of no further use or effect” and claiming that “when completed, [East Potomac Golf Links] will be open to the public while, at the same time, designed to the highest level of golf and able to hold world class tournaments such as the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship, the Ryder Cup, and the Presidents Cup.”
In his Sunday post on social media, Trump said golf course architect Tom Fazio created the redesign plan for East Potomac and that construction will begin on Nov. 15 and completed in “approximately 15 months.”
Attorneys for the Department of Interior argued in motions over the weekend that there was “no final agency action” regarding a redesign plan and that the tree removal was part of previously scheduled maintenance.
“What am I to do with the fact that I have from the President of the United States two statements that the Secretary of the Interior is onboard with the plan to redesign the park when I’m considering final-agency action?” asked Reyes, who implemented a 14-day temporary restraining order last week banning tree removal and has been asked by plaintiffs to extend that order to pause any future work at the course until the case can be litigated.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs say the work is inflicting irreversible damage and that the redevelopment would violate the congressional act that created the park where the course is located.
Attorneys for the government said that there is currently no plan to close East Potomac on Nov. 15 and that the restoration project is still being developed by the Department of Interior, despite Trump’s claims on social media.
“If, as I have been told today by the Department of Justice, there is no plan to start [the redesign] immediately and that there is no plan to close the park on Nov. 15, if there is no urgency to anything, then what is the equity from the government’s perspective against entering the stay solely as we have it right now of cutting down no further trees pending litigation and the notice requirement?” Reyes asked the government’s attorneys.
The redesign plan that Trump posted on social media includes an 18-hole course with a large driving range and rebuilt clubhouse, but no White Course, which is currently a par-34 executive course, or Red Course, which is also a nine-hole layout and billed as a “beginner course.”
The new plan would also remove Ohio Drive to allow the redesigned layout to move closer to the shores of the Potomac River. Ohio Drive is a popular spot for city residents to bike, run and bird watch, according to various reports.
Trump also took to social media early Monday, arguing the Department of Interior can renovate the course “as [a] right” and called Reyes, who was appointed by Democratic President Joe Biden, a “crazed lunatic whose courthouse tapes will reveal, may be insane?”
Reyes told attorneys for the government that, “Absolutely, I’m going to make a factual finding that the trees were cut down of a plan [to redesign the golf course],” and also referenced reports on CNN that she has received death threats because of the rulings in this case.
“Even if [the reports are false], the kind of e-mails I’ve been receiving and the kind of voicemails that I’ve been getting, that this is where we are that a federal judge is getting death threats over a golf course … I really don’t think that’s what the founders envisioned,” Reyes said before the hearing was adjourned.