Miami residents sued President Donald Trump, Miami Dade College and Florida state officials on Wednesday, alleging that the decision to donate an iconic stretch of downtown Miami property for Trump’s future presidential library 鈥� which might also house a hotel 鈥� is unconstitutional.
The lawsuit argues that the president, his presidential library foundation and state officials 鈥� including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis 鈥� violated the Domestic Emoluments Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits states from giving a financial benefit to a sitting president.
The White House didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment on Wednesday night.
DeSantis moved last September to transfer a 2.63-acre (1.06-hectare) parcel of land to Trump’s presidential library foundation. Since then, the president and his son Eric Trump shared extravagant plans for library. An artificial intelligence video includes panning shots of the tower鈥檚 exterior and interior, with a presidential jet parked in the lobby alongside a gold escalator like the one Trump rode while in 2015. Other shots show a giant ballroom like the one he鈥檚 planning for the White House, a replica Oval Office, rooftop gardens and a large, gold statue of Trump.
The president also suggested that there could be for-profit entities in the building.
鈥淭his concept could be an office, but it鈥檚 most likely going to be a hotel with a beautiful building underneath,” Trump said to reporters in March.
The complaint argued that means the land 鈥渋s no longer available to serve MDC鈥檚 student community and Downtown Miami. Instead, the land will house a Trump hotel that brings riches to the President.鈥�
The property that was donated to Trump’s foundation is owned by Miami Dade College and sits next to the , a historic building that rises alongside the glitzy condos facing palm tree-lined Biscayne Bay. The Spanish Revival skyscraper once housed one of the city鈥檚 first newspapers, but later served as a resource center for hundreds of thousands of Cubans seeking asylum in the United States, according to Miami Dade College, which now operates the site as a museum.
The site is valued at roughly $67 million, according to a 2025 assessment by the Miami-Dade County property appraiser. Other real estate experts, including appraisers cited in the lawsuit, have wagered that the parcel could sell for hundreds of millions of dollars more.
Lawyers with the Constitutional Accountability Center in Washington, D.C., and Miami-based law firm Gelber Schachter & Greenberg filed the lawsuit on behalf of a student at Miami Dade College, two people who live near the donated parcel of land and a local nonprofit organization that had hoped to use the parcel as the site of an urban farm.
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