Trump says White House helipad work is done after August project restart

President Trump on Sunday announced that the White House helipad, which was redone at his request last month, has been completed.

Trump posted a photo of former President Dwight D. Eisenhower on the White House lawn before departing in an Air Force H-13J helicopter in July 1957, becoming the first U.S. president to fly in a helicopter, on Truth Social. Eisenhower was leaving for Camp David, taking a helicopter at the insistence of the Secret Service, according to the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum .

“Dwight Eisenhower didn’t need a Helipad at the White House for those little Choppers, but America needs one now — Just completed, and MAGNIFICENT!” Trump wrote in the post.

The project began after crews removed the fighting arena from the White House’s South Lawn after the “Freedom 250 UFC” event to celebrate Trump’s 80th birthday in June. Trump said the following month that Sikorsky Aircraft, a subsidiary of Lockheed Martin and the company that manufactures the new helicopters for the president, is covering the $6 million cost of the project.

It was in August that Trump requested changes to the helipad. The Washington Post reported that Trump was dissatisfied with the construction. He showed interest in a landing pad level with the horizon and considered leveling the South Lawn’s slopes.

It is unclear what additional costs the new construction could add to the project.

Trump later showed the construction to reporters, praising the work on the helipad and the White House ballroom. He heralded how the helipad looked “incredible from the air and from every place else,” and emphasized how well it will look for future meetings with world leaders. He also signed the slab during his uninterrupted 30-minute tour with reporters.

The helipad is designed for Marine One, designed to be 100 feet wide and made from 4-inch-thick granite from a quary in California, with the helipad adorned with the presidential seal.

Workers told the president at the time that construction will be finished by Sept. 21, two days before Chinese President Xi Jinping is scheduled to meet with Trump.

“We might make it for President Xi,” Trump said. “That’d be nice but not imperative.”

The helipad, along with the ballroom, is among several of Trump’s renovation projects across the nation’s capital.

Construction of the ballroom and the demolition of the East Wing received a wave of criticism from past administration officials and relatives of former presidents. It has also faced legal challenges, with the Supreme Court, in a split 5-4 decision last week , lifted a lower court’s block on construction.

The case raised by preservationists could return to the high court, but the ruling allows construction, made up from a 250-person crew working 20 hours a day, seven days a week, to continue.