President Donald Trump’s name was removed from the iconic John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on June 13 after efforts to halt the court-ordered name reversal failed.
A large white tarp covered sections of the building in Washington on Saturday morning after crews worked overnight to remove the letters from the venue’s exterior.
On May 29, District Judge Christopher R. Cooper ordered that Trump’s name be removed, ruling that only Congress may change the venue’s name. He also blocked the venue’s planned closure, which would have begun after July 4, allowing it to undergo renovation for two years.
“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.
After the latest ruling, which caused the official name reversal, Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio), who filed a lawsuit in December 2025 to ban the name change, visited the venue on Friday to tout her successful efforts to remove Trump’s name.
“We were on the side of justice,” Beatty said to a small crowd of people.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, in a June 13 social media post, applauded the removal of Trump’s name on the building, which he criticized as “presidential graffiti.”
Trump appointed himself to the chairman of the venue’s board of trustees after he entered his second term as president in early 2025.
After the venue’s two-year closure and its renaming were blocked by the court, Trump said he wants to transfer its operations to Congress.
He accused Democrats of caring “more about opposing your favorite President, ME, than saving a dying Performing Arts Center.”
“[Therefore,] we are going to be working with Congress to transfer this failing Institution back to them so they can make a determination as to what to do with it,” he said.
Matthew Vadum contributed to this report.
