Trump vows appeal of East Potomac ruling as golf operations remain unclear
In a social media post, President Donald Trump called U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes’s temporary restraining order “highly destructive and political.”
President Donald Trump said Sunday that his administration would appeal a federal judge’s decision blocking the closure of East Potomac Golf Links, adding more uncertainty to the immediate future of the historic public course.
In a social media post, Trump called U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes’s temporary restraining order “highly destructive and political” and said the Interior Department “has the absolute right” to remake the property. The administration “will immediately appeal, on an expedited basis,” Trump wrote.
It’s unclear, though, whether the administration can immediately appeal.
Reyes issued a temporary restraining order Saturday night — one day before the administration planned to close East Potomac Park to the public. The order remains in effect through Nov. 28.
Parties can generally not immediately appeal temporary restraining orders, because they are meant to be short-term and preserve the status quo. But there have been exceptions, and an appeals court would first have to decide whether Reyes’ order is one it has the authority to review now.
Spokespeople for the Justice Department, the National Park Service, and the Interior Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment Sunday morning.
The judge’s decision, which preserved public access to the historic Hains Point property, was a significant setback for Trump’s effort to replace East Potomac’s three public courses with a single championship course. Golfers and preservationists are suing to block his plans.
The Trump administration said the planned closure was unrelated to those efforts and it needed to close the property because of safety concerns and because National Links Trust, East Potomac’s longtime operator, was set to stop managing the facility.
Reyes said Saturday that the administration’s stated reasons for closing the property this weekend were “pretextual” and that the administration, “in its haste to meet an arbitrary deadline,” had probably violated federal environmental and administrative laws.
Her order temporarily bars the administration from closing the park while the court considers the preservation groups’ broader legal challenge.
The order leaves unclear what will happen at East Potomac Golf Links beginning Monday.
Reyes ordered that the golf-course property, Ohio Drive, and the surrounding parkland remain “open and accessible to the public.”
But she stopped short of requiring the Park Service to continue offering golf. “Nothing in this Order requires Defendants to (1) operate East Potomac Golf Course for play, or (2) enter into any contract with any concessioner to operate East Potomac Golf Course for play,” Reyes wrote.
Whether and how to provide golf is up to the government, she said, but officials “cannot use the absence of golf operations as a reason to exclude the public from the Course.”
Trump, meanwhile, renewed his criticism of the condition of East Potomac, which he called “one of the worst and most dangerous golf courses anywhere in the U.S.” He said delaying work would cost “golf seasons, jobs, prestige, and much money.”
