The Trump administration filed an appeal on Thursday challenging a judge’s order that the president’s name must be removed from the John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts and that the center can’t be closed for two years for renovations.
The appeal was filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
On May 29, a federal district judge ruled that President Donald Trump’s name be removed from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and blocked officials from closing it for two years to make renovations.
Judge Christopher R. Cooper issued the order ruling that the center’s statute requires it to be named for Kennedy and cannot be altered unilaterally by the board.
The judge found the board likely violated its fiduciary duty in ratifying Trump’s closure announcement. He noted the injunction allows needed repairs but does not prevent future closure decisions by the board after independent review. The judge said that only Congress can rename the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
“The Kennedy Center’s organic statute 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,” Cooper said.
“Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it,” the judge said.
The center was renamed the Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) in December 2025. Beatty was an ex officio board member.
Beatty posted on X on June 10 about Trump’s name having to come off.
“Tick Tock! Trump only has two days until the court ordered deadline to take his name OFF the Kennedy Center,” Beatty posted. “If he doesn’t, he’ll have to answer to me and a judge. Take it off!”
Trump said in a May 29 post on Truth Social that The Kennedy Center was having renovations done due to “years of neglect, decay, and poor maintenance.”
The president said the center had rotting beams and a parking area that are subject to collapse.
The Kennedy Center is a bureau of the Smithsonian Institution and its general trustees are appointed by the president.
In February 2025, Trump was elected chairman of the Kennedy Center by its newly constituted board of trustees in a shakeup of leadership at the Washington-based arts institution.
Trump criticized the previous leadership at the center for promoting “anti-American propaganda” and said he would replace them with his “vision for a Golden Age of American Arts and Culture.”
