Kennedy Center Board Votes to Close Until Trump’s Name Is Added

Originally named the National Cultural Center, the act authorized construction of the building and established it as an independent institution with a mission to host arts and cultural events and educational programming.

Kennedy Onassis and Mamie Eisenhower served as honorary co-chairwomen of the project.

President Lyndon Johnson signed the John F. Kennedy Center Act in January 1964 to change the name and provide $23 million in federal funds for its construction.

After signing the bill, Johnson handed the pen to Edward Kennedy, John F. Kennedy’s brother.

“As this center comes to reflect and advance the greatness of America, consider then those glories were purchased by a valiant leader who never swerved from duty — John Kennedy. And in his name I dedicate this site,” Johnson said at the groundbreaking ceremony, held in December 1964.

Designed by architect Edward Durell Stone, the Kennedy Center was built on the banks of the Potomac River using 3,700 tons of marble gifted to the US from Italy.

For its opening event, the Kennedy Center hosted a performance of “Mass” by Leonard Bernstein, which was commissioned by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.

The first Kennedy Center honorees included Fred Astaire, Marian Anderson, George Balanchine, Arthur Rubinstein, and Richard Rodgers.

Beyoncé brought the Kennedy Center to its feet with a fiery tribute to Tina Turner in 2005, and President Barack Obama shed tears as he watched Aretha Franklin perform “Natural Woman” to honor Carole King in 2015.

Trump did not attend the Kennedy Center Honors during his first term, but has taken a much more active role in shaping the institution in his second non-consecutive term.

After taking office earlier this year, he fired the president and Biden-appointed members of the Kennedy Center’s board of trustees, replacing them with allies and members of his administration. The board then elected Trump as its chairman.

While visiting the performance venue in March, Trump told board members that the building was in “bad shape” and said he planned to renovate the space.

“We’re going to make a lot of changes, including the seats, the décor, pretty much everything needs a lot of work,” he said.

At the 2025 Kennedy Center Honors, held on December 7, honorees received newly designed medallions from Tiffany, featuring blue ribbons instead of the traditional rainbow colors.

In December, the White House announced that the board had “unanimously” voted to rename the Kennedy Center the Trump Kennedy Center, and the website was updated to reflect the change.

Trump’s name was added to the building’s signage on December 19, reading “The Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.”

“The unanimous vote recognizes that the current Chairman saved the institution from financial ruin and physical destruction,” Roma Daravi, the center’s vice president of public relations, said in a statement to Business Insider. “The new Trump Kennedy Center reflects the unequivocal bipartisan support for America’s cultural center for generations to come.”

Trump said he was “honored,” while Democratic lawmakers and members of the Kennedy family criticized the president.

Kennedy’s grandson, Jack Schlossberg, contested the White House’s claim of a unanimous vote, writing on X that “microphones were muted and the board meeting and vote NOT unanimous,” while Kennedy’s niece, Maria Shriver, wrote on X that the change is not acceptable.

Six Democratic lawmakers said in a statement that Trump was “attempting to affix his name to yet another public institution without legal authority.”

Trump announced in a Truth Social post that the center will be closed for renovations for two years, starting July 4.

Trump also called the Center “tired, broken, and dilapidated,” and said that the administration consulted with contractors, music experts, art institutions, and other advisors and consultants to review the building.

In his post, Trump said the period of closure would involve a complete rebuilding of the Center, to make it “the finest Performing Arts Facility of its kind, anywhere in the World.”

Representatives for the White House did not respond to queries from Business Insider asking how much the project would cost.

As part of a lawsuit brought by Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty, who serves as an ex officio Kennedy Center member, Judge Christopher R. Cooper wrote in his ruling that “Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it,” and ordered that Trump’s name be removed from the building and other materials.

Cooper also wrote in his ruling that Kennedy Center board members did not have “sufficient information” to “make a well-considered decision” before they voted to close the Center for two years and ordered it to remain open.

In a court filing, the Justice Department wrote that if the $257 million renovation is not completed, “the Center will deteriorate further into an unsafe, decrepit structure that will be required to be taken down.”

A proposal drafted by the Kennedy Center board, also submitted as part of a court filing, included alternative ways to incorporate Trump’s name into the institution, such as “With Gratitude for Support from President Donald J. Trump and the Trump Kennedy Center Fund.” The board maintained that “without such appropriate recognition it is unlikely that President Trump will provide the fundamental oversight of the renovation of the main building and lead the fiscal rescue of the Center.”

“Blue” was installed at The Kennedy Center in 2019, described at the time as a permanent installation.

The Kennedy Center did not share why the statue was removed. Josef Palermo, the Kennedy Center’s former curator of visual arts and special programming, wrote in The Atlantic in April that “Blue” had been “targeted early on” for removal by the Trump administration to make way for new works of art as part of the planned renovation.

Trump wrote on Truth Social that the Kennedy Center had voted “almost unanimously” to close “immediately,” and would remain shuttered until the DC Circuit federal appeals court rules on his proposed name change.

“If the ruling is a negative one, which it should not be, and is not overturned by the US Supreme Court, the Reconstruction and the Renovation of The Kennedy Center will not take place,” he wrote.

When reached for comment, the White House referred Business Insider to the president’s Truth Social post.

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in December 2025. It was most recently updated in September 2026.