Two golfers in Washington, D.C., sued the federal government on Friday to try to prevent the Trump administration from overhauling a more than 100-year-old public golf course, accusing the administration of violating environmental laws and polluting a park that is on the National Register of Historic Places.
The suit is the latest in a series of legal battles challenging President Donald Trump's extraordinary efforts to put his mark on public spaces in the nation's capitol, including shuttering the Kennedy Center.
At the end of last year, a group of preservationists filed a similar lawsuit seeking to prevent the administration from demolishing the East Wing of the White House in order to build a ballroom — a project slated to cost $400.
Trump, who is an avid golfer himself, also plans on renovating a military golf course just outside of Washington that has been used by past presidents going back decades.
The complaint filed against the Department of the Interior on Friday says that the Trump administration's reconstruction of East Potomac Park — which includes the East Potomac Golf Course — would violate the congressional act that created the park in 1897. The roughly 130-year-old act established the park for the “recreation and the pleasure of the people."
The golf course, which has since been recognized on the National Register of Historic Places in part for its efforts to racially integrate in the 1940s. Municipal golf courses make up only 18% of courses in America.
"East Potomac Golf Links is a testament to what’s possible with public land and why public spaces matter," said Washington resident and plaintiff Dave Roberts. “It deserves better than becoming a dumping ground for waste and yet another private playground for the privileged and powerful.”
The lawsuit came after the Trump administration in December ended a lease agreement the nonprofit National Links Trust held for East Potomac and two other golf courses in Washington. The Interior Department said it did so because the nonprofit hadn't implemented required capital improvements and failed to meet the terms of the lease.
The Interior Department press office said in an email Friday that it doesn’t comment on pending litigation.
However, it said it would “ensure these courses are safe, beautiful, open, affordable, enjoyable and accessible for people visiting the greatest capital city in the world which is in line with President Trump’s agenda.”
The White House also didn't respond to an emailed request for comment on Friday evening.
Construction on the East Potomac course has already begun, according to the lawsuit. In October, the National Parks Service began dumping debris from the demolition of the East Wing of the White House onto the golf course, the complaint said, raising concerns that the materials could contain contaminants that could pollute the air.
As a result, the plaintiffs argued, the administration of also violated the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to consider the harmful environmental impacts of the project.
The National Links Trust said in December they were “devastated” by the decision to terminate the lease and defended their management of the courses.
They said $8.5 million had gone toward capital improvements at the courses and that rounds played and revenue had more than doubled in their tenure managing the courses. They also added that the termination of the lease jeopardized hundreds of local jobs.
The nonprofit has agreed to keep managing the courses for the time being, but long-term renovations will stop.
The first 18 holes of the East Potomac Park Golf Course were built from 1918 to 1923.
President Donald Trump speaks to reporters before boarding Air Force One at Pope Army Airfield, in Fort Bragg, N.C., Friday, Feb. 13, 2026, en route to Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Multiple residents of an affordable housing complex in Portland, Oregon, have bought gas masks to wear in their own homes to protect themselves from tear gas fired by federal agents outside the immigration building across the street. Others have taped their windows or stuffed wet towels under their doors, while children have sought security by sleeping in closets.
Some told their stories to a federal judge Friday, as they testified in a lawsuit seeking to limit federal officers' use of tear gas during protests at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building following months of repeated exposure.
The property manager of the apartment building and several tenants filed the suit against the federal government in December, arguing that the use of chemical munitions has violated residents' rights to life, liberty and property by sickening them, contaminating their apartments and confining them inside. They have asked the court to limit federal agents' use of such munitions unless needed to respond to an imminent threat.
“They’re simply trying to live their lives in peace in their homes," Daniel Jacobson, an attorney representing the plaintiffs, said during the hearing. "Yet our federal government is knowingly putting them through hell, and for no good reason at all.”
The defendants, which include ICE and the Department of Homeland Security and their respective heads, say officers have deployed crowd-control devices in response to violent protests at the building, which has been the site of demonstrations for months.
"The conduct at issue, law enforcement’s use of crowd-control tactics to disperse unlawful crowds, does not even come close to shocking the conscience," Samuel Holt, an attorney for the federal government, said during the hearing.
The case comes amid growing concern over federal officers using aggressive crowd-control tactics, as cities across the country have seen demonstrations against the immigration enforcement surge spearheaded by President Donald Trump's administration.
In testimony, tenants of the Gray's Landing apartment complex described experiencing difficulty breathing, coughing, dizziness and other symptoms following exposure to chemicals from tear gas, smoke grenades and pepper balls. Gas canisters have hit apartments and been found in the building’s courtyard and parking garage, plaintiffs said.
A resident who used a pseudonym in court filings due to being a domestic violence survivor said she has a gas mask in her bedroom, in her living room and in her backpack, and that she has slept with one on. She described how the gas entered her apartment and triggered her post-traumatic stress: ”I could feel it, I could see it, I could taste it, I could smell it."
Erica del Nigro, another resident, said the chemicals have triggered her autoimmune syndrome and that her 12-year-old son has had hives, rashes and nightmares. Doctors have prescribed him multiple medications, including an inhaler, which he didn't need before the gassing began, she testified.
Diane Moreno, who said she has slept in her bathtub to avoid the chemicals seeping inside, said she has to have one of her adrenal glands removed due to the stressful environment exacerbating a disease that causes her to overproduce cortisol. “Not feeling safe and happy in your own home is a big stressor," she testified.
Other plaintiffs include a 72-year-old Air Force veteran who has been diagnosed with shortness of breath and mild heart failure, and a father who has taken his 7- and 9-year-old daughters to urgent care for respiratory symptoms. The girls sometimes sleep in his closet to feel safe, according to the complaint.
During the hearing, attorneys for the federal government questioned whether residents were trained in assessing imminent threats or unlawful behavior, and whether they were close enough to incidents to directly observe why officers may have deployed munitions.
The plaintiffs filed an updated request for a preliminary injunction limiting federal officers' use of tear gas late last month, after agents launched gas at a crowd of demonstrators including young children that local officials described as peaceful.
Of the affordable housing complex’s 237 residents, nearly a third are age 63 or older, according to court filings. Twenty percent of units are reserved for low-income veterans and 16% of tenants identify as disabled.
The government said in court filings that federal officers have at times used crowd control devices in response to crowds that are “violent, obstructive or trespassing" or do not comply with dispersal orders.
It has also pushed back against the claims of tenants' constitutional rights being violated, saying that under such an argument, “federal and state law enforcement officers would violate the Constitution whenever they deploy airborne crowd-control devices that inadvertently drift into someone's home or business, even if the use of such devices is otherwise entirely lawful.”
The hearing will resume next week. It came after a federal judge in a separate Oregon lawsuit, filed by the ACLU of Oregon on behalf of protesters and freelance journalists, temporarily restricted agents' use of tear gas during protests at the building.
FILE - Law enforcement officers stand in the street to allow vehicles to leave a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility during a protest in Portland, Ore., Oct. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Jenny Kane, File)
FILE - A view of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility, top left, in Portland, Ore., Oct. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Jenny Kane, File)
Federal agents lobbed tear gas and flash bangs at protesters in front of the ICE building on Jan. 31, 2026, in Portland, Ore. (Allison Barr/The Oregonian via AP)
