Kennedy Center Board Appeals Order to Remove Trump’s Name (2)

The Kennedy Center board is waging an 11th-hour effort to stop the removal of President Donald Trump’s name from the building.

The board of trustees filed a brief notice of appeal late Thursday on the eve of the deadline from a federal judge to remove the current lettering referring to the building as the “The Donald J. Trump And John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.” Board members — who were appointed by Trump and elected him as their chairman — have said the renaming was to honor his efforts to revitalize the center.

The Kennedy Center in Washington, DC.

Photographer: Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg

US District Judge Christopher “Casey” Cooper concluded that only Congress had the power to change the Washington center’s name after choosing it in honor of the slain 35th president. He also ruled on May 29 that the trustees could not proceed, for now, with the plan they approved in March to shutter the center for a two-year renovation project.

Cooper’s decision was a setback for Trump’s efforts to reshape Washington’s historic landmarks aesthetically. The president has also faced legal challenges to efforts to construct a new ballroom on the site of the White House’s demolished East Wing, paint the granite exterior of the 19th-century Eisenhower Executive Office Building, change the color of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, and build a 250-foot triumphal arch.

Trump’s second term in office has proved a tumultuous time for the center. Several prominent artists and musicians have refused to perform there, including the Washington National Opera, the Martha Graham Dance Company and the musical Hamilton.

Read More: Trump Retreats From Kennedy Center Project After Court Loss

Trump initially responded to Cooper’s ruling by saying he would turn over control of the Kennedy Center to Congress. In a social media post, the president decried the ruling by the Barack Obama-appointed judge and said he would be “working with Congress to transfer this failing Institution back to them so they can make a determination as to what to do with it.”

Then, last week, Trump floated that he’d remain in charge of the center.

“I’m the chairman, so we’ll just keep it going. Somebody has to do it,” Trump told reporters. “It’s lost hundreds of millions of dollars for years, and yet it’s something you have to keep going, you know. It’s the arts.”

The center’s trustees voted Thursday to seek a last-minute court order pausing Cooper’s ruling, the Washington Post reported, citing unidentified people familiar with with the matter.

In a late night request to Cooper, the center’s trustees argued that if the judge doesn’t pause the Friday deadline to take Trump’s name off the building, they ‘’will be forced to squander time and money — by both removing the signage and then potentially returning it after appeal — that cannot be recovered.”

Three Democrats in Congress who are ex-officio Kennedy Center trustees issued a statement condemning the board’s decision to keep the legal fight going.

“It’s clear to me after this latest board meeting that some of Donald Trump’s appointees are more focused on elevating the President than advancing the arts,” said Representative Joyce Beatty of Ohio said in the statement.

(Updates with statement by ex-officio board members in final paragraphs.)

--With assistance from Erik Wasson.

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