WASHINGTON — Democratic lawmakers are demanding more information about donations from several of America’s largest tech companies to President Donald Trump’s White House ballroom project, which included the destruction of the East Wing.

In the wake of the release of the donor list Thursday, they raised potential conflicts of interest over corporate donations from Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta and others to a project personally important to Trump. Many of the companies benefit from government contracts or face important legal or regulatory decisions in the future.

Rep. Steny H. Hoyer, D-Md., said the donation list, including through the settlement of at least one lawsuit brought by the president, “appears very much like a shakedown.” He also highlighted the presence of executives of several of the tech companies at the presidential inauguration in January after their donations to Trump’s inaugural committee.

Hoyer added that there is particular motivation for tech companies to curry favor with the president given pending investigations or legal cases. “I don’t think they’re doing it all of a sudden because they fell in love with giving away their money,” he said.

A group of Democratic House appropriators, including Hoyer, sent a letter dated Thursday to the Office of Management and Budget, the National Capital Planning Commission and the National Park Service demanding a list of donors to the project and how much each gave, as well as whether any foreign entities or individuals donated.

Rep. Glenn F. Ivey, D-Md., signed on to that letter in his role as a member of the House Appropriations Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee. He suggested examining which of the tech companies involved have government contracts or who are currently pursuing them, as well as open investigations or litigation.

“It’s a pretty long list, which is why, you know, normally you wouldn’t allow this type of funding, especially of this magnitude in a federal project like this involving, you know, the White House or the presidency,” he said.

Ivey bemoaned the failure to fund the project through the appropriations process.

“I think you go through Congress, and ... we set the money aside, you have the hearings. I think you’d have some sort of architectural designs done,” he said, going on to add, “And that’s a process that could have been and should have been used here.”

A group of Democratic senators led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., sent their own letter, also dated Thursday, to the National Park Service and the Trust for the National Mall, which is receiving donations for the project.

In it, the senators noted that the $300 million construction project is occurring during the partial government shutdown and amid rising costs for consumers. They also challenged the nonprofit trust’s role in regard to the ballroom, compared to its past work with private donors.

“However, the scale of funds raised for President Trump’s ballroom, President Trump’s personal involvement in fundraising for the project, and the number of corporate donors with business before the Trump Administration raise new questions about whether the Trust is facilitating corrupt access to and favor-seeking from President Trump and his Administration,” the letter said.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., signed the Senate letter and also sent letters to the donor companies on Friday in his capacity as ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee’s investigations panel. In the letters he asked companies to “list all White House personnel or other representatives or associates of the Trump Administration or Trump family with whom you have spoken about the donation,” as well as disclosing all lobbying contacts with the White House and executive agencies.

In comments to reporters on Oct. 23, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump “has been incredibly transparent” about the $300 million ballroom project, and stressed that it is being funded by him and private donors.

“This is going to be a magnificent addition to the White House for many years to come and it’s not costing the taxpayers anything,” she said.

Potential conflicts

Noah Bookbinder, president of watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, highlighted that most of the companies on the list “want things from this administration.”

“Giving this money seems like a good way for them to try to bring the president around to looking at them favorably, especially where he has shown, at this point, a long pattern of making favorable decisions toward those who bring business to him or give money to things that he cares about,” Bookbinder said.

He added that there’s not currently evidence that the donations or Trump’s solicitation of them would be illegal.

“This is not something that is personally enriching the president, and it doesn’t seem like it’s against the law, unless you were to have evidence of an explicit quid pro quo where there was some specific government action that was being promised in exchange ... for giving money to those programs.”

Still, Bookbinder listed some of the possible conflicts of interest.

“The trade negotiations and back and forth with China about rare earth minerals certainly affect Apple in a very direct way, and Amazon has massive contracts with the federal government,” he said.

YouTube, which is owned by Google, agreed in a September settlement of a lawsuit Trump brought against the company to pay $22 million to the Trust for the National Mall, a nonprofit partner of the National Park Service.

Google is also the subject of an antitrust case that was decided in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in September. Google could still appeal that case, which the Department of Justice prosecuted.

Meta, parent company of Facebook, was recently the subject of a whistleblower hearing into children’s use of its virtual reality platform. It has also invested heavily in artificial intelligence, which the White House has said “must be unencumbered by bureaucratic red tape.” A Meta spokesperson said the company had no comment.

Other tech donors to the project include HP Inc., Micron Technology and Microsoft, while cryptocurrency companies Ripple, Tether America and Coinbase are also included in the donor list.

A Coinbase spokesperson said in a statement, “Coinbase is pleased to support Trust for the National Mall, a 501c3 partner of the National Park Service.”

Telecommunications giants Comcast and T-Mobile also donated to the project. T-Mobile said in a statement that it donated to the trust ahead of the 250th anniversary of the United States.

“T-Mobile has no role in the use of those funds or decisions related to the construction of the ballroom.”

The donor list is below:

—Altria Group Inc.

—Amazon

—Apple

—Booz Allen Hamilton Inc.

—Caterpillar Inc.

—Coinbase

—Comcast Corporation

—J. Pepe and Emilia Fanjul

—Hard Rock International

—Google

—HP Inc.

—Lockheed Martin

—Meta Platforms

—Micron Technology

—Microsoft

—NextEra Energy Inc.

—Palantir Technologies Inc.

—Ripple

—Reynolds American

—T-Mobile

—Tether America

—Union Pacific Railroad

—Adelson Family Foundation

—Stefan E. Brodie

—Betty Wold Johnson Foundation

—Charles and Marissa Cascarilla

—Edward and Shari Glazer

—Harold Hamm

—Benjamin Leon Jr.

—The Lutnick Family

—The Laura & Isaac Perlmutter Foundation

—Stephen A. Schwarzmann

—Konstantin Sokolov

—Kelly Loeffler and Jeff Sprecher

—Paolo Tiramani

—Cameron Winklevoss

—Tyler Winklevoss

©2025 CQ-Roll Call, Inc., All Rights Reserved. Visit cqrollcall.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.