I doubt that this is political theater. The judge — who is a neutral party here, and introduced the question — is asking a pretty straightforward question, testing the argument that the lawyer is making. “If your argument that Trump can rebuilt the wing of the White House holds, it seems that it’d entail X (where X is something that it seems like we wouldn’t want). Is that true?”

If you read court transcripts, this isn’t an uncommon thing for a judge to do.