WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House wants to build an underground center to provide security screening for visitors, the latest step in the Trump administration’s plan to overhaul the grounds.
Plans, including renderings of the 33,000-square-foot (3,066-square-meter) center, were included in the preliminary agenda released on Friday for the April meeting of a federal commission that approves construction on federal land in Washington.
The screening facility would be built beneath Sherman Park, which is located southeast of the White House and directly south of the Treasury building.
The park had for a long time been the place where White House tourists and guests lined up for security checks before they cleared a series of trailer-type structures and walked to the East Wing entrance. President Donald Trump tore down the East Wing last fall to build a ballroom. Visitors currently line up near Lafayette Park, across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House.
The new screening facility would have seven lanes to ease processing and reduce wait times. Construction could begin as early as August, according to the plans, as the White House said it wants the facility operating by July 2028, six months before Trump's term ends.
The monument of Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman in the center of Sherman Park would not be removed, according to plans for the project, which is a collaboration of the Executive Office of the President, the U.S. Secret Service and the National Park Service, which manages the White House grounds.
The National Capital Planning Commission, which oversees federal construction, planned to discuss the proposal at its April 2 meeting, according to the tentative agenda circulated Friday.
Also on that meeting agenda is a debate and a final vote on plans by the Republican president to build a 90,000-square-foot (8,360-square-meter) building, including a large ballroom, where the East Wing stood.
FILE - The White House is seen Feb. 24, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)
HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) — A North Texas man who claimed he wasn’t the shooter in a fatal robbery that killed two people nearly 18 years ago and who said prosecutors misused rap lyrics he wrote to secure his death sentence was executed Thursday evening.
James Broadnax was pronounced dead after receiving a lethal injection at the state penitentiary in Huntsville, about 70 miles (113 kilometers) north of Houston.
Earlier Thursday, the U.S. Supreme Court denied a request by Broadnax’s attorneys to stop his execution.
He was condemned for the 2008 shooting deaths of two men outside a suburban Dallas music studio. Prosecutors say Broadnax and his cousin, Demarius Cummings, fatally shot and robbed Stephen Swan and Matthew Butler in the parking lot of Butler’s recording studio in Garland. Cummings was sentenced to life without parole.
Broadnax was defiant in a final statement in which he also sought forgiveness from the victims' relatives. Seven relatives, including parents of each of the victims, were present.
“I prayed to God for your forgiveness," he said, when asked by the warden if he had a final statement. “Despite what you think about me, I hope to God that prayer was answered. But no matter what you think about me, Texas got it wrong. I’m innocent, the facts of my case should speak for itself. Period," he said.
The execution also was punctuated by screams of “I love you” from his wife, who also was among witnesses to the punishment. She was emotional at times during the procedure, leaning up to the death chamber window with arms spread, and had to be helped out of the prison.
As the lethal dose of the sedative pentobarbital began, Broadnax urged his supporters to keep fighting. “Don’t give up,” he said, and was stopped in another mid-sentence by a gasp. He shook his head briefly and all movement stopped. He was pronounced dead 21 minutes later, at 6:47 p.m. CDT.
Prosecutors said Broadnax, 37, confessed to the shooting, telling reporters during jailhouse interviews that “I pulled the trigger” and that he had no remorse.
His lawyers had focused his final appeals on two issues: Cummings had recently confessed to being the shooter; and Broadnax’s constitutional rights were violated because prosecutors eliminated potential jurors during his trial on the basis of race.
“I’m really gonna tell it like it’s supposed to be told, that it was me, that I was the killer. I shot Matthew Bullard, Steve Swan,” Cummings said recently from prison in a video created as part of the efforts to stop Broadnax’s execution.
His attorneys also alleged prosecutors dismissed all seven potential Black jurors on the basis of their race, “utilizing a spreadsheet during jury selection that bolded only the names of every Black juror,” according to court documents. One Black juror was later reinstated to the jury. Broadnax was Black.
In a 1986 ruling known as Batson v. Kentucky, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that excluding jurors because of their race violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
Broadnax’s attorneys had argued in an earlier appeal that prosecutors had violated his constitutional rights by using some of the rap lyrics he wrote to portray him as a violent and dangerous person in order to secure a death sentence. A number of A-list rappers, including Travis Scott,T.I. and Killer Mike, had filed briefs at the Supreme Court in support of Broadnax’s appeal.
Theresa Butler, Matthew Butler’s mother, had asked that the execution proceed.
“This so called confession from cummings is just a stall tactic by Broadnax’s desperate defense team. Its all a lie,” Butler wrote in a post on social media.
Broadnax was the third person put to death this year in Texas and the 10th in the country. Texas has historically held more executions than any other state.
About an hour before Broadnax’s execution on Thursday, Florida put to death James Ernest Hitchcock, 70, for beating and choking his 13-year-old step-niece to death.
Lozano reported from Houston. Follow Juan A. Lozano: https://x.com/juanlozano70
This undated photo provided by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice on Wednesday, April 29, 2026, shows Texas death row inmate James Broadnax. (Texas Department of Criminal Justice via AP)
FILE - The main entrance of the building housing the execution chamber at the Huntsville Unit of the Texas State Penitentiary is seen, Oct. 17, 2024, in Huntsville, Texas. (AP Photo/Michael Wyke, File)
