The board of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts voted Thursday to put President Donald Trump’s name back on the building — just two months after a federal judge ordered it removed.
The latest move follows an earlier attempt to rename the institution. Last year, the Trump-allied board voted to change the center’s name to the Trump-Kennedy Center, and Trump’s name was quickly added to the building’s marble facade.
U.S. District Judge Christopher R. Cooper ruled in May that the change violated federal law, which established the center as a memorial to President John F. Kennedy. Cooper found that only Congress has the authority to change the center’s name and ordered Trump’s name removed from the building and official materials. The center complied in June but is appealing the ruling.
Now the board is taking a different approach.
Rather than formally renaming the center, it approved an inscription beneath the Kennedy Center’s main signage that would read: “Restored and Renovated by President Donald J. Trump.”
The move appears to be an attempt to return Trump’s name to the building without technically changing the institution’s official name — and could test the limits of Cooper’s order as well as federal law governing memorials at the center.
The board resolution directs officials to honor Trump by “all legal means” for what it describes as his role in bringing the center back “from the brink of disaster.” Other possibilities reportedly include naming the grounds the “President Donald J. Trump Plaza.”
Center Will Close for Renovations
The board also voted Thursday to move forward with Trump’s plan to close the Kennedy Center’s main building for approximately two years while extensive renovations are completed.
A newer part of the campus, known as the Reach, would remain open for limited programming and serve as the active memorial to Kennedy during construction.
Plans presented to the board outline about $250 million in work, including structural repairs, new marble flooring, theater improvements, updated equipment, redesigned interior spaces, new restrooms and $11.8 million in acoustical improvements. The target reopening is summer 2028.
Trump has described the Kennedy Center as “tired, broken and dilapidated” and has argued that closing it entirely would allow renovations to be completed more quickly and safely.
But the closure has become entangled with another problem facing the institution: declining programming, ticket sales and participation by artists following Trump’s takeover of the center.
Trump replaced much of the Kennedy Center board in 2025 with allies, who then elected him chairman. Since then, prominent artists have canceled appearances or severed ties with the institution, employees have departed and ticket sales have declined.
Broadway touring productions have gone elsewhere for the coming season, while the National Symphony Orchestra has yet to announce a season that would normally begin in September.
That turmoil has fueled questions about whether the two-year closure is solely about construction.
Rep. Joyce Beatty, an Ohio Democrat who holds an ex officio seat on the Kennedy Center board, raised that issue in her lawsuit challenging the closure. She argues the shutdown could help mask a financial downturn caused in part by declining ticket sales and artists refusing to perform at the center.
The board maintains its decision was based on an independent analysis concluding that keeping the building open during phased renovations would be substantially more expensive and raise safety concerns.
Cooper previously blocked the closure after finding that the board’s original decision was based on a “one-sided presentation of information” and failed to adequately consider the center’s legal obligation to both maintain and operate the national performing arts venue.
The judge will now review whether the board conducted sufficient due diligence before Thursday’s new vote.
That review could determine not only whether the Kennedy Center can close for two years, but whether Trump’s name can once again appear prominently on a building Congress designated as a memorial to John F. Kennedy.