A federal judge on Friday blocked the Kennedy Center from temporarily closing its doors for a yearslong renovation and said its board violated the law when it added President Donald Trump’s name to the historic performing arts venue.
US District Judge Casey Cooper concluded that the law establishing the center “makes crystal clear that the Center is to be named for President Kennedy, and it cannot bear any other formal name or public memorial based on the Board’s unilateral say-so.”
“Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it,” Cooper wrote in his 94-page opinion.
Within two weeks, Cooper ruled, officials must remove any signage from the Kennedy Center that includes Trump’s name and update its website to remove all references to the name “Trump Kennedy Center” or the “Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.”
He said the center was permanently blocked from “displaying, installing, or maintaining any physical or digital signage on the Kennedy Center building or grounds that designates, suggests, or implies that the institution is named for any person other than President John F. Kennedy.”
