Kennedy Center Board Votes to Add Trump’s Name, Close
The Kennedy Center board voted Thursday to add President Donald Trump’s name to the facade of the performing arts venue and move forward with a two-year closure plan for renovations, according to AP News. The decisions directly challenge a federal judge’s May ruling that declared both actions illegal.
The board voted to add a phrase below the center’s official name, “The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts,” reading “Restored and Renovated by President Donald J. Trump,” and also voted to rename the physical site “the President Donald J. Trump Plaza,” according to Rep. Joyce Beatty’s legal team. The actions are subject to approval by U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, who previously ruled that Trump’s name was added illegally and blocked the closure.
A Direct Challenge to the Court
Judge Cooper ruled in May that only Congress had the authority to change the institution’s name, as it was dedicated to President Kennedy in 1964. He ordered Trump’s name removed from the building and temporarily blocked the closure plan, writing that the board’s initial decision was “ill-informed and seemingly preordained.” According to NPR, Cooper stated: “None of the board members had sufficient information in advance of the March 16 meeting to make a well-considered decision to close the center.”
Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH), an ex officio board member who filed the federal lawsuit against Trump and the board, condemned Thursday’s vote. “This latest development is a transparent effort to circumvent the Court’s ruling, and flies in the face of the statutes that Congress passed,” Beatty said in a statement. “I will continue to fight for this treasured national monument.”
Her attorneys, Norm Eisen and Nathaniel Zelinsky, were equally blunt, telling Deadline that the vote was “more of the same, and a show of blatant disrespect to the courts. The court already ruled against the board when it bowed to Trump’s demands. Now, the defendants must answer for their actions—again—in court.”
The Renovation Plan
The board approved a plan to close the main building while keeping The Reach, a 2019 addition, open for limited programming and as a memorial to John F. Kennedy. The $250 million renovation project includes structural repairs, new marble floors, nearly $12 million in “acoustical improvements,” and a plan to temporarily move the 3,000-pound bronze bust of JFK. Under the approved plan, the main campus would reopen in the summer of 2028.
Congress appropriated $257 million in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act for Kennedy Center repairs and renovations. Matt Floca, the Kennedy Center’s executive director and chief operating officer, defended the approach: “When the president asked: ‘How do you make these projects the best? How do you make them really excellent and deliver them efficiently?’ my recommendation was you close the building and you do everything over a definite period of time, two years.”
The board has until next week to present its plan to Judge Cooper, who will determine whether the board conducted sufficiently thorough due diligence this time around. The board meeting was held by Zoom and was not public.
An Institution in Crisis
The Kennedy Center, once a bustling arts complex offering free public performances 365 days a year, now sits largely empty. The Washington National Opera left in January 2026, and many marquee artists canceled planned performances after Trump’s name was added to the center in December 2025. Ticket sales plummeted, and scores of staffers and administrators departed.
The National Symphony Orchestra, whose budget is tethered to the complex, has been pushed to “the deepest financial crisis in its recent history,” according to the Washington Post. On Monday, a Washington, D.C. superior court judge ordered the Kennedy Center to pay jazz musician Chuck Redd more than $252,000 in legal fees after the center sued him for canceling a performance in protest of the name change, as NPR reported.
Trump’s name was removed from the building in June, but a large tarp has covered the area where it once stood. The center’s final large events ended in early July, the original target date for closure.
Broader Push to Reshape Washington
The Kennedy Center moves are part of Trump’s broader push to reshape the physical landscape of the nation’s capital. Other projects include demolishing the East Wing of the White House for a controversial ballroom, remodeling the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, planning extensive renovations of a golf course in East Potomac Park, and moving forward with a triumphal arch near Arlington National Cemetery.
Trump has derided the Kennedy Center as “rusted, rotted, and rat and bug infested” and threatened to hand the building over to Congress after Cooper rejected the closure and the addition of his name.
What’s Next
The critical question now is whether Judge Cooper will approve the new plan or determine that the board has again failed to conduct sufficient due diligence. Democratic legislators serving as ex-officio trustees said they had not been given access to assessments of what closure would mean for the institution’s long-term wellbeing.
As The Guardian noted, the center has until next week to share its plan with Cooper, who will review whether the board carried out sufficiently thorough due diligence ahead of the vote. The Kennedy Center is also appealing the judge’s May ruling.
Beyond the immediate legal battle, this case tests the limits of presidential authority over federally designated memorials and cultural landmarks—and whether a president can unilaterally rename or close institutions dedicated by Congress. The outcome will have lasting implications for how presidential power interacts with cultural institutions across the nation.