A federal judge opened a formal investigation Friday into whether Justice Department attorneys and others within the Trump administration misrepresented the president’s plans to renovate a golf course in Washington, DC, ratcheting up a dramatic showdown between the White House and the courts.
In a fiery hearing that lasted nearly three hours, US District Judge Ana C. Reyes pressed Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward on whether the administration had tried to evade the court’s review, including by offering a last-minute notice before felling hundreds of trees at East Potomac Golf Course and by insisting there was no formal plan to renovate the course despite President Donald Trump’s repeated insistence he was moving ahead.
