An Ohio lawmaker is asking a judge to order the removal of Donald Trump’s name from the Kennedy Center, arguing that the arts center’s board violated the law that only Congress can make such a change.
Representative Joyce Beatty (D-OH) is also asking the court to block the closure of the facility, which is scheduled for July, saying the board did not review or consult with experts but followed Trump’s decision to close it. Trump, who chairs the center’s board, announced plans to close the social media site on February 1, saying such a major move was needed as the building was being renovated.
In a decision filed in federal court in Washington on Wednesday, Beatty’s legal team says the board’s actions, in renaming and closing, breached its fiduciary duties.
His lawyers argued that only Congress could change the name of the center, as they called it a “sole memorial” to President John F. Kennedy in a law passed in 1964, just months after he was assassinated.
“There is no more clear or significant breach of fiduciary duty than for the Board to violate the central purpose of the institution it is charged with protecting and which Congress enacted: to preserve the Center as a memorial to John F. Kennedy – and no one else,” Beatty’s legal team wrote in a motion for incomplete summary judgment.
Read the proposal to remove Trump’s name from the Kennedy Center.
Read the draft budget for the renovation projects.
The board voted to rename it in December and, a day after the board’s action, the team put Trump’s name outside the facility, and the name change was represented on the website and social media, among other places. Beatty, who was an ex-officio member, denied being barred from attending or voting at a board meeting, and filed a lawsuit later that month.
A spokesman for the Kennedy Center did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In his filing, his attorneys cited language in the 1964 law, including that the building would be “designated” to be named after Kennedy. They also cited other congressional directives, including a 1983 law that states “no additional memorials or memorial plaques shall be designated or placed in public areas of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.”
The board’s decision to rename the center was followed by the withdrawal of artists from events including Philip Glass and Renée Fleming. They follow other artists and brands, including Hamilton and Ben Folds, who left or canceled programs after Trump took over the agency shortly after taking office for his second term.
Earlier this month, US District Judge Christopher Cooper ordered the agency to allow Beatty to participate in a March board meeting and provide him with information supporting the facility’s closure plans. However, at the meeting, the board, which was chaired by Trump appointees, went ahead with plans to close the building.
Beatty’s legal team called the shutdown “an unorganized and unreasonable process that shows irreparable damage to the nation’s wealth.” They argued that the documents obtained by Beatty were four financial maintenance reports approved by former Kennedy Center administrators in 2021, 2022 and 2024. They all expected the center to remain open during the renovations.
“With no support, and what appears to be public response and players fleeing the center after it was illegally renamed to honor a sitting president and board chairman-elect, the Defendants rushed to close the Kennedy Center,” Beatty’s legal team wrote.
They say the board is simply “stamping” Trump’s wish, pointing to the president’s comments at the last meeting. Trump said, “It’s a little late on the board because we’ve already announced it, but these are small details, but I think everyone agrees.”
“A shutdown without that kind of preparation would be the illegal demolish-first-ask-questions approach that President Trump sadly adopted with the East Wing of the White House — destroying protected buildings before anyone could stop him,” Beatty’s legal team wrote in the filing.
Trump argued that the shutdown was necessary to speed up the overhaul, and that keeping it open would disrupt ongoing operations.
In a statement, Beatty said, “Donald Trump’s attempt to rename the Kennedy Center after himself is not just an act of self-aggrandizement. It is an attempt to undermine our Constitution and the law. Congress established the Kennedy Center by law, and only Congress can change its name.”
His attorneys, Norm Eisen, founder and board member of Democracy Defenders Action, and Nathaniel Zelinsky, senior attorney at the Washington Litigation Group, said in a statement, “Congress created the John F. Kennedy Center as a living memorial to President Kennedy. Donald Trump or his hand-picked colleagues on the Board have no power to ignore or repeal the law by renaming it.”
