Construction crews in hard hats and neon green high-vis vests erected scaffolding Friday to begin removing Donald Trump’s name from the Kennedy Center’s marble facade after a federal judge and panel of appeals court judges denied the administration’s 11th-hour attempts to rename the venue after himself.
But Friday’s midnight deadline came and went without any letters removed from the building. After hours of construction work and several last-ditch legal filings, the Kennedy Center missed the court-ordered deadline. Workers began adding a tarp to the towering scaffolding shortly after 1 a.m. while dozens of people watching the debacle cried out “shame.”
Last month, Washington, D.C., District Judge Christopher Cooper blocked the administration from changing the name of the iconic performing arts center, noting that Congress made it “crystal clear” that the building is to only be named after former President Kennedy, “and it cannot bear any other formal name or public memorial” based on a “unilateral say-so.”
“Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it,” Cooper wrote May 29.
The Trump administration is appealing that ruling and asked Cooper to pause his decision during the legal fight. That request was rejected Friday afternoon.
The government failed to demonstrate that it would be likely to win on appeal or suffer “irreparable harm” if Trump’s name was taken off the building while a legal challenge continues, Cooper wrote.
A crowd chanted “take it off” as construction workers reached the president’s name above Kennedy’s later that afternoon.
Workers left the building after an afternoon downpour and returned that evening, working past midnight as tens of thousands of people watched livestreams from news agencies broadcasting the construction site.
Judge Cooper had ordered compliance by midnight June 12 in his May 29 order, but the Trump administration fired off an exclamation-point filled emergency appeal hours before the deadline. The D.C. appeals court denied that emergency appeal Friday evening.
The government also asked for a 12-hour delay in a last-ditch bid to stall removal of the president’s name, citing bad weather that forced workers off the job.
In their emergency appeal, lawyers for the Kennedy Center’s Trump-appointed board argued for the first time in the legal battle that the president’s name is integral to the venue’s finances.
“Without the name, ‘Trump’ on the Building, our fundraising will not only come to a halt, but any and all monies raised or committed would be obligated to be returned, refunded, or terminated,” according to the Friday afternoon filing.
Lawyers for the board argued that its bylaws now stated that donations to the center are conditioned on the name “remaining unchanged” and keeping Trump’s name on the facade.
“All of this money, hundreds of millions of dollars, will have to be immediately returned, or not received by the Center,” according to the filing.
On June 5, Kennedy Center officials ordered staff to “immediately” change email signatures, letterhead and other documents back to The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts” or “Kennedy Center” no later than June 12, according to an internal memo shared in court documents.
The Kennedy Center also removed the president’s name from the website.
Images of construction crews stripping the president’s name in metal letters from the building’s exterior are another embarrassing blow in the mountain of legal challenges against the administration.
The president’s latest loss follows a lawsuit from Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty, who is also an ex officio trustee of the center. Last year, she challenged the Kennedy Center board’s decision to permanently add the president’s name to the building, which is set to close on July 4 to “begin Construction of the new and spectacular Entertainment Complex,” according to Trump.
Beatty labelled Trump’s rebranding a “personal vanity project.”
The renovations join the president’s dramatic transformation of the nation’s capital with his multi-billion dollar package of gilded, taxpayer-supported renovations and new construction that caters to his tastes – from the demolition of the East Wing of the White House for a massive ballroom to plans for the world’s largest “triumphal” arch and an overhaul of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
The White House Rose Garden was also torn up to make way for a Mar-a-Lago-like patio area, and the president has filled the Oval Office with gold details and installed plaques along the outside of the White House walls to honor and demean his predecessors.
The removal of his name from the Kennedy Center also follows the construction of a towering Ultimate Fighting Championship ring on the White House lawn, where MMA fighters will compete in an event that coincides with the president’s birthday on Sunday.
After last month’s ruling, Trump raged at the judge and the decision on his Truth Social, where he appeared to announce that he was abandoning the project altogether.
He said it would be “impossible” to keep the institution open while construction is ongoing, and that he now has “no interest” in renovations and will instead 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.”
“I took great pride in taking over a losing Institution, and looked forward to making it into a Great and Prestigious WINNER for Washington, D.C., and indeed, the United States of America,” Trump wrote.
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