President Donald Trump is attempting to remake Washington DC's historic East Potomac golf course in his own image — and on Thursday, a judge appointed by President Joe Biden pushed back, opening a court session by quoting cultural figures ranging from Alanis Morissette to Dr. Seuss.

As Politico's Kyle Cheney posted on X on Thursday, Judge Ana Reyes, a federal district court judge in Washington, began her hearing in colorful fashion.

"In the first 90 seconds of Judge Reyes' hearing on the East Potomac golf course, she has referenced 'Alanis Morissette; A random caller demanding her removal from the bench; The Lorax; and George Washington chopping down a cherry tree,'" Cheney wrote.

The references carried symbolic weight. The Lorax is a Dr. Seuss character who famously claimed to "speak for the trees," and the legend of George Washington chopping down a cherry tree — and then refusing to lie about it when confronted — speak directly to the controversy at hand: Trump has cut down Washington DC's oldest cherry blossoms as part of his proposed renovations to the East Potomac golf course. Those cherry trees, located on East Potomac Park, are among the capital's most cherished public assets, part of a cherry blossom tradition in Washington that dates to a 1912 gift of trees from Japan and draws large crowds each spring.

Although Trump initially said he would make only modest renovations to the course — which trusts argue he has no legal authority to renovate at all — a recent report by The Washington Post showed the changes are far more drastic. The dispute sits at the intersection of long-running debates over how much control a president can exert over public lands and federal parkland in the nation's capital, where many green spaces are overseen by the National Park Service.

"The plans, visible in photographs taken during Trump's visit, seem to stretch the redesigned golf course across nearly the entire East Potomac peninsula, extending play to the shoreline," the Post's Rick Maese wrote. "The renderings do not appear to show several of the park's best-known public amenities, including the riverside bicycle trail, the miniature golf course and Washington's oldest grove of cherry trees. The drawings offer the clearest glimpse yet of how the Trump administration wants to transform one of the nation's oldest municipal golf facilities into a championship-caliber venue capable of hosting the U.S. Open, the Ryder Cup and other major tournaments."

Rick Reilly, a sports journalist best known for writing about Trump's golf game — and arguing that his notorious cheating on the course epitomizes his broader approach to governing — recently denounced the renovations in vivid terms.

"Notice how Trump [screwed] up everything?" Reilly wrote. "Reflecting pool was fine. Now it's fenced off. Kennedy Center was fine. Now it's closed. WH was fine. Now it looks like a 99-cent Thai joint. Boats sailed thru Hormuz. Now Iran owns it. Golf was cool. Now there's a greasy orange splotch on it."