Kennedy Centre adds Donald Trump’s name to performing arts institution in Washington
The Kennedy Center said the vote recognized Trump’s work to revitalize the institution, but critics of the vote, including Democratic members of Congress who are ex-officio board members and some historians, insist only Congress can change the center’s name.
“The Kennedy Center is named by statute. Changing the name would require a revision of the 1964 statute,” Ray Smock, a former House historian, said in an email.
Donald Trump’s name was plastered on the facade of the Kennedy Center in Washington on Friday.Credit: Bloomberg
“The Kennedy Center board is not a legislative body. Congress makes the laws.”
The Kennedy family also opposed this move.
“It is incomprehensible that this sitting president would seek to change the name of this great monument dedicated to President Kennedy,” Maria Shriver, a member of the Kennedy family, said in a post on X on Thursday, when the board’s decision was first announced.
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John F. Kennedy’s niece, Kerry Kennedy, said in a social post on X that she would remove Trump’s name herself when his term ends.
“Three years and one month from today, I’ll get a pickaxe and get those letters out of that building, but I’ll need help holding the ladder. Are you in?” he wrote on a photo of the center’s new name. “I’m applying for my carpenter’s card today, so this will be a union job!!!”
Bloomberg, A.P.
