XElement adds an xmlns

I'm using Linq to XML to create a new XML file. Some part of the file do I get from an existing XML file. I use the following code for this.

var v2 = new XDocument(
  new XDeclaration("1.0", "utf-16", ""),
  new XComment(string.Format("Converted from version 1. Date: {0}", DateTime.Now)),
  new XElement(ns + "keyem",
    new XAttribute(XNamespace.Xmlns + "xsd", xsd.NamespaceName),
    new XAttribute(XNamespace.Xmlns + "xsi", xsi.NamespaceName),
    new XAttribute(xsi + "schemaLocation", schemaLocation.NamespaceName),
    new XAttribute("version", "2"),
    new XAttribute("description", description),
    new XElement(ns + "layout",
      new XAttribute("type", type),
      new XAttribute("height", height),
      new XAttribute("width", width),
      settings.Root)       // XML from an existing file

The problem is that it adds xmlns = "" the first element from the existing file.

The result is:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?>
<foo 
  xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" 
  xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
  xsi:schemaLocation="http://tempuri.org/KeyEmFileSchema.xsd KeyEmFileSchema.xsd"
  xmlns="http://tempuri.org/KeyEmFileSchema.xsd">
  <settings xmlns="">
      ...
  </settings>
</foo>

The XML file I'm reading from looks like this, but I can change it if needed

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?>
<settings>
  <colormaps>
    <colormap color="Gray"     textcolor="Black"/>
    <colormap color="DarkGray" textcolor="White"/>
    <colormap color="Black"    textcolor="White"/>
    <colormap color="Cyan"     textcolor="Black"/>
  </colormaps>
  <macromaps>
    <macromap pattern="^@([0-9A-F]{2})\|([0-9A-F]{2})$"  replace="{ESC}$1{ESC}$2{MOUSERESET}"/>
    <macromap pattern="^\$([0-9A-F]{2})\|([0-9A-F]{2})$" replace="{USERCLICK}{ESC}$1{ESC}$2{MOUSERESET}"/>
    <macromap pattern="^\$([0-9A-F]{2})$"                replace="{USERCLICK}{ESC}$1"/>
  </macromaps>
  <keydefault color="Cyan"/>
  <groupdefault color="DarkGray"/>
</settings>