STORM CENTER

Trump Takes Twisted Revenge on Kennedy Center for Name Snub

A judge blocked the president’s name from being put on the Kennedy Center or its campus.

Just hours after a judge blocked his hand-picked board from adding his name to the Kennedy Center, Donald Trump vowed that the building would not be renovated unless it bore his name.

The president fired off a series of social media posts on Tuesday as District Judge Christopher Cooper blocked the center’s board from slapping his name on the building.

Right after the ruling, the president’s board voted separately to close the performing arts center for two years.

Trump celebrated the board’s closure vote, but he also threatened that no renovations would take place without his name being added back to President John F. Kennedy’s memorial.

“The closing will take place immediately; however, the Renovation and Reconstruction, which is a very large and complex job, cannot begin until such time as the D.C. Circuit rules on the Board’s approved name. If the ruling is a negative one, which it should not be, and is not overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court, the Reconstruction and the Renovation of The Kennedy Center will not take place,” Trump wrote.

Earlier in the day, Trump ranted in another 300-word post on Truth Social that the Kennedy Center is “in a virtual state of collapse” right before the judge’s decision on the name was released.

Cooper blocked the Kennedy Center from inscribing “renovated and restored by Donald J. Trump” on the main building or renaming the campus the “President Donald J. Trump Plaza.”

“Simply put, Defendants cannot install memorials for President Trump or anyone or anything else at the Kennedy Center without Congress’s blessing. The board resolution bucks a federal court order and a statute Congress enacted,” he wrote.

Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty, an ex officio member of the Kennedy Center board who’s been leading the fight against Trump’s takeover, argued on Tuesday that the first step to saving the Kennedy Center was blocking Trump’s name from the building. Her lawyers noted that the court has already ordered the Center to remain open, so the board’s vote on Tuesday could not close it.

But as the fight played out, Trump melted down on Truth Social. He has pushed to shut down the performing arts center for two full years for renovations.

“The Kennedy Center is in a virtual state of collapse, and has been for many years. A large piece of concrete and steel just dropped down, in a thud, from the ceiling of a heavily trafficked main hallway,” Trump wrote in his earlier post. “If the Building were open, innocent people would have been killed. A security guard had just passed the area, one minute prior to this ceiling collapse. He was, therefore, 60 seconds away from certain death.”

Trump claimed only he could save the Kennedy Center despite a series of setbacks, including a dramatic plunge in ticket sales and artists canceling in response to his takeover. Past leaders of the center have also disputed his claims that the space was in disrepair.

“The Judge has made us keep it open even though there are no performances, and no people that would have the Courage to even go in,” Trump wrote. “The Board of The Kennedy Center has strongly voted to save it, and they know I’m the only one who can do so, because I have the ability to raise the money, and the ability to construct — that few others have. I also have the strength and power of the Presidency, which will be needed do what must be done, and give it a strong shot at Greatness again!”

He went on to attack the judge as “hostile and conflicted,” ranted that the building is “destined to doom,” and raged, “Time is our Enemy!”

Tuesday’s ruling was the second time Cooper has blocked Trump’s name from being added to the center. The Obama-appointed judge also ruled in May that renaming the center after the president was unlawful, and the Kennedy Center was forced to take Trump’s name down after it was added to the building in December.

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In his ruling on Tuesday, Cooper accused the government of playing word games to get Trump’s name back up at the Kennedy Center. He also noted that the “Trump Kennedy Center Fund” has not yet raised any money.

The judge ordered Trump to notify the court in writing if and when the $100 million has been raised for the Kennedy Center and to provide 60 days’ notice before taking any action to install an acknowledgment of Trump, the Trump Kennedy Center Fund, or other fundraising efforts.

Cooper also noted in his ruling that the government “offered ‘no proof that current or future donations hinge on President Trump’s name being on the building’ and ‘no competent evidence that removing the Trump name would prevent the Center from fulfilling its artistic mission, as it has done for the last sixty years.’”

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He also went so far as to indicate that the president’s name being added to the building late last year was the very reason for some of the challenges the center now faces that the president is claiming he alone can fix.

“In fact, evidence before the Court pointed in the opposite direction: The renaming of the Center coincided with declines in revenue and contributions, as artists canceled performances, the Washington National Opera ended its 50-year residency, and ticket sales and viewership of the Kennedy Center Honors broadcast dropped precipitously,” he wrote.

While the fight over the center’s future is far from over, Beatty celebrated the ruling against adding Trump’s name to the building.

“The law is extremely clear: The John F. Kennedy Center is named for President Kennedy—and no one else. But President Trump is holding the Kennedy Center hostage unless he can put his name on this sacred memorial,” Beatty responded to the ruling. “The Court just rejected this proposal for the second time. This unlawfulness is as breathtaking as it is wrong, and it needs to stop.”

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