Property Violations
My Note: If you live in a development, condo, planned community or town with a "Home Owners Association" (HOA), you know the dread a HOA letter carries. They always start with, You are in violation - "You have 10 day to clean your roof", "Cut your trees that are obstructing the street"... It seems the HOA the governs the "Peoples House", the people of the USA, have a problem with an unauthorized demolition. Read what the DailyBeast thinks: See my concluding comments at the end.
Michael Ian Black
Published Oct. 22 2025 2:13PM EDT
Dear Occupant,
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| White House expands East Wing demolition as critics decry Trump overreach - The Washington Post |
A couple of days ago, I awoke to the sound of heavy machinery. I’d been out the day before attending my local No Kings march—no offense—and was trying to get a little extra shuteye before starting my work week began. Imagine my surprise when I looked out the window to investigate the source of the sound and discovered a couple of cranes demolishing a large section of your rental!
I’m sure you know where this is going.
When you moved in, you were supposed to receive a copy of the HOA handbook. (We call it our Constitution—cute, right?) I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you didn’t receive one, because I cannot imagine any other reason why you thought it would be ok to partially destroy a historic house you do not even own.
You will see that I enclosed a copy of the handbook with this letter. Please refer to Article IV, section 3, which reads, “Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States.”
The building you just ripped apart? It doesn’t belong to you. It belongs to the people of the United States. As such, I regret to inform you that you are in severe violation of the HOA.
To be fair, it’s not entirely your fault. Well, actually it is but I know we all love to blame the HOA. Or immigrants. And really, we should have spoken up more forcefully when you decided to rip up your garden and cover it with concrete. Everybody loved that garden. We decided not to make a big deal out of it because you’d just moved back in and were trying to be good neighbors, but we can now see that was a mistake.
Quick question: did the landlord conduct a proper credit check before approving your lease?
Yes, other occupants have made renovations over the years, but always by going through the appropriate channels—we’re generally very accommodating. We even let a previous tenant put in a bowling alley!
Obviously, though, a 90,000 sq. ft. ballroom replacing an entire, historic wing of your property is an order of magnitude greater than a couple of lanes in the basement. All the more reason why we should have had more of a conversation before you took it upon yourself to tear things down. Even temporarily, that is, unless you were planning on extending your lease, which would also be a violation of the rules. (Please refer to the handbook’s 22nd Amendment.)
Moreover, the homeowner’s association would have very much liked the opportunity to weigh in on whether your rental property really needs an outsized vanity project which impacts the curb appeal of our entire street (and the broader reputation of our city) as well as presenting obvious conflicts of interest between you and all the corporate donors who are surely going expect political largesse in exchange for the generous ‘donations’ solicited for said project. Why not just put on a stoop sale instead?
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I apologize for being the bearer of bad news. But the fact remains: We have rules for a reason. We don’t let people in this neighborhood do whatever they want whenever they want because if we did that, we’d have total chaos. I mean, we might even end up with roving gangs of armed marauders snatching people up off the street! Worse still, novelty costumes.
Obviously, I’m exaggerating to make a point. Such a thing could never happen in the United States. But I’m doing so to illustrate that when people disregard the rules—such as the rule that doesn’t allow renters to tear down their house to erect a gold-gilded authoritarian fantasia without permission—we risk ruining the entire character of the neighborhood. It used to be a pretty good neighborhood, and I think we can make it great again, just as soon as you play by the rules.
Or pack up your sh-t and get the hell out.
Huffington Post 10/23/2025: The East Wing, where first ladies created history, planned state dinners and promoted causes, is now history itself. The two-story structure of drawing rooms and offices, including workspace for first ladies and their staffs, has been turned into rubble, demolished as part of the Republican president’s plan to build what he said is now a $300 million ballroom nearly twice the size of the White House.
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One other note: Trump historically never pays his bills. Guess who will likely be stuck paying for this two acre monstrosity that overwhelms the existing historic structure. The bill has already gone up 100 million since it was announced six months ago and construction has not started. Don't hold you breath waiting for your invitation to the ball in a ballroom you never needed.
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