Five justices let Trump’s ~90,000 sq ft White House ballroom keep rising after the East Wing demolition, holding that the National Trust for Historic Preservation and historian Alison Hoagland lack standing because they were not “directly harmed.”

Chief Justice Roberts joined the three Democratic appointees in dissent: the project is “likely unlawful” and the People’s House architecture is too bound up with public meaning to skip the rules.

The columnist says that standing logic would let a president raze landmarks—or let a future Democratic president tear the ballroom down and hand out rubble like Berlin Wall chips—and that Congress will not sue while it wants invitations.

When the Supreme Court doesn’t want to decide on the legality of some issue, it often finds that a plaintiff lacks “standing” — that is, doesn’t have sufficient interest in the issue to merit the court’s involvement. 

The five Trump-sympathizers on the court allowed construction to continue on Trump’s........

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