The move by the board of trustees the Kennedy Center to add President Donald Trump‘s name to the D.C. cultural institution was illegal, a federal judge ruled Friday.
U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper ordered Kennedy Center officials to remove Trump’s name from the building within two weeks. In a related ruling, Cooper granted a request by U.S. Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) for a preliminary injunction to block Trump — for now — from taking any further steps toward closing the institution. Trump earlier this year had said the Kennedy Center would shut down for two years starting July 4, 2026, to undergo a “complete rebuilding.”
“The Court has concluded that the Board overstepped its statutory bounds by unilaterally renaming the Kennedy Center after President Trump,” Cooper wrote in his May 29 ruling on Beatty’s motion. “Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it.”
Because the Kennedy Center board is “currently in violation of Congress’s express statutory direction, the Court will order that they remove President Trump’s name from the institution’s title, as represented on the façade of the Center, any other physical or digital signage, and official materials,” the judge said in the ruling.
