Kennedy Center’s Abrupt Plan to Shut Down May Spark Further Legal Battles
Rep. Joyce Beatty, an ex-officio board member of the Kennedy Center who sued President Trump over his plans for the arts institution, blasted the decision to shut down the Center.
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On Tuesday, the board voted to shut down the Kennedy Center immediately, according to media reports and a post from Trump, which they said was to allow for renovations to the center. This vote came after a federal judge had issued an injunction earlier in the day, blocking the board from adding Trump’s name to the Kennedy Center.
The board had added his name earlier this year, but Beatty had sued, seeking a court order to halt the closure of the Center and reverse its name change. She issued a statement Tuesday suggesting she will bring the matter of the closure to the court.
“For years, the Kennedy Center has planned to undergo phased renovations, in which we both renovate and maintain some performances. This is how major performing arts centers in the country operate. But donors, patrons, and artists all fled after the unlawful attempt to rename this sacred memorial after Donald Trump,” Rep. Beatty said Tuesday. “Donald Trump only cares about the Kennedy Center for his vanity. That is wrong and it is a breach of his fiduciary duty as a trustee. Congress established the Kennedy Center as a living memorial to President Kennedy, and I am proud to defend this cherished institution.”
“The Board’s latest shutdown vote is more of the same failure and abuse that has characterized this administration’s treatment of the Kennedy Center,” said Rep. Beatty’s counsel, Norm Eisen (ret.) of Democracy Defenders Action and Nathaniel Zelinsky of Washington Litigation Group. “The unlawful renaming drove audiences and artists away. Now the Board has voted to shut down yet again to hide the terrible mismanagement under its current leadership. We’ll see the Defendants in court.”
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In his post on Truth Social Tuesday, Trump said the board, which he handpicked and who voted him in as chairman, voted for the immediate closure for “safety reasons,” and in order to begin what he said were “large and very complex” renovations.
However, he said that he would be appealing the decision not to add his name to the building and said that these renovations would not begin without his 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.
