Kerry Kennedy says she’s ready to bring a pickax to the Kennedy Center — not for renovations, but for the name now bolted to its front.
After a Thursday board vote and a Friday exterior unveiling in Washington, the performing arts venue now carries President Donald Trump’s name alongside John F. Kennedy’s, setting off protests, procedural complaints and a very public promise of future undoing.
Kennedy, described as John F. Kennedy’s niece and the sister of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., said she intends to remove the redesign once Trump is no longer in the White House.
The rebranding traces to a Thursday vote by the Kennedy Center’s board members, described in the report as Trump’s hand-picked board members.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said earlier Thursday the board voted unanimously to rename it the Trump-Kennedy Center, a move she said was expected to infuriate Democrats and Washington’s arts community.
Democrats, meanwhile, argued the naming of the building is controlled by Congress and criticized Trump for not following the law, highlighting what the story described as unresolved legal complications and questions.
The story reported the board includes voting and non-voting members, and that the “unanimous” vote came from those described as loyal to Trump.
It also said non-voting ex officio members did not cast ballots — which became the flash point when Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty, identified as an ex officio member, posted a video opposing the move.
“For the record. This was not unanimous. I was muted on the call and not allowed to speak or voice my opposition to this move,” Beatty said.
“Also for the record, this was not on the agenda. This was not consensus. This is censorship,” Beatty added, framing the board action as both rushed and stifling.
Kennedy Center President Richard Grenell responded to Beatty by saying ex officio members do not vote, writing that “all ex officio Members never get to vote.”
You can call that governance or you can call it gatekeeping, but the practical point is simple: The people allowed to vote did vote, and the building now reflects it.
On Friday, the change went from paperwork to metal as workmen used scissor lifts to affix new lettering to the Kennedy Center’s exterior.
A blue tarpaulin dropped to reveal the updated sign: “The Donald J Trump and the John F Kennedy Memorial Center For the Performing Arts.”
Not the biggest issue in American culture, one commenter quipped, but even the typography drew side-eye — “Not the biggest sin going on here, but why couldn’t they use the same typeface? Look at the difference in the Ns.”
The story said security personnel spoke with a protester while the work continued, underscoring how quickly a facade update became a political scene.
The Kennedy Center’s newly rebranded X account posted photos of the lettering and declared, “Today, we proudly unveil the updated exterior designation -- honoring the leadership of President Donald J. Trump and the enduring legacy of John F. Kennedy.”
Multiple people compared the whole thing to “The Derek Zoolander Center for Kids Who Can’t Read Good,” a joke that lands because cultural elites love nothing more than mocking what they can’t control.
Trump said Thursday he was “surprised” by the rebranding, while also saying he was “honored,” and adding, “The board is most distinguished people in the country. I was surprised by it. I was honored by it. We saved the building.”
The report also noted he had purged the board after calling it “too woke” and had already talked about having his name added, which makes the surprise sound more like a talking point than a plot twist.
Grenell previously told the Daily Mail that Trump’s real estate background helped save the 54-year-old landmark from demolition, saying engineers urged a teardown and a big ask to Congress, but that he toured Trump through damage, including a collapsing sewer system, and Trump responded, “I can save it.”
Trump asked Congress for $250 million for the project in the “One Big Beautiful” bill that passed just before the bicameral July 4 recess, and the story said he became the first sitting president to host the Kennedy Center Honors after remarking the center “could never be built again.”
The story described naming a national institution after a sitting president as unprecedented in U.S. history, noting other landmarks were named for presidents only after their deaths — a norm that, until now, acted like a speed limit.
Kerry Kennedy, though, is already planning the removal: “Three years and one month from today, I’m going to grab a pickax and pull those letters off that building, but I’m going to need help holding the ladder.”
She followed up with, “Are you in? Applying for my carpenter’s card today, so it’ll be a union job!!!” — a line that plays as a joke, but also as a blunt reminder that today’s cultural fights increasingly look like construction projects: whoever controls the tools, controls the sign.
