The Kennedy Centre’s board of directors votes to close the centre immediately

According to two people who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss the matter, the senior management of the John F. Kennedy Centre for the Performing Arts voted today to close the venue, after the board had warned of the need for an immediate closure to avoid endangering people’s lives. The vote took place a week and a half after a section of the plaster ceiling in the centre’s main foyer collapsed, falling 18 metres to the floor below, which was empty. Critics have accused the centre’s management of exaggerating the building’s structural problems to justify a closure which, they claim, may be a cover-up for financial mismanagement during Donald Trump’s presidency. Previously, a federal judge had barred the Kennedy Centre from re-adding Trump’s name to the venue, which is dedicated to the performing arts and serves as a presidential memorial.

U.S. Judge Christopher Cooper has upheld most of the ruling issued more than three months ago, when he determined that the centre’s board of directors had voted unlawfully to add Trump’s name to the building’s façade and ordered its removal. On 13 August, the board of trustees voted to restore Trump’s name to the building, but Cooper stated that this too would violate the law and his previous order, “which reflects Congress’s decision to commemorate President Kennedy, and no one else, at the Centre that bears his name”. “Put simply, the defendants may not install memorials to President Trump or to anyone else or anything else at the Kennedy Centre without the approval of Congress,” Cooper stated in his ruling. “The board of trustees’ resolution conflicts with a federal court order and with a law enacted by Congress.”

The lawyers representing MP Joyce Beatty (a Democrat from Ohio), a member of the Kennedy Centre’s board of directors who objected to the addition of Trump’s name, welcomed the judge’s ruling, describing it as “a victory for the memory of President Kennedy and for our nation”. Beatty criticised the president for allegedly prioritising his own vanity over the needs of an institution that serves both as a memorial to an assassinated president and as one of the country’s leading performing arts venues. “President Trump is holding the Kennedy Centre to ransom unless he is given the chance to have his name affixed to this sacred memorial,” Beatty said in a statement. “The Court has just rejected this proposal for the second time. This unlawful behaviour is as baffling as it is wrong, and it must stop.”

Shortly before Cooper issued his ruling, Trump had criticised him, describing him as “a very hostile judge with a conflict of interest”. Previously, Trump had described Cooper – who was appointed as a judge by President Barack Obama – as "a corrupt federal judge with a serious conflict of interest" and had insinuated that Cooper had issued the ruling against him because the judge’s wife, a lawyer, represents former President Joe Biden. The centre’s board of directors had initially prepared to consider a further proposal to honour Trump on the building’s façade. But on Monday evening, lawyers for the Department of Justice informed a judge that the board would focus exclusively on a resolution for the immediate closure of the centre’s main building.

In documents removed from today’s agenda, the centre’s managers state that they have exhausted their financial resources and may be unable to pay salaries or cover routine maintenance costs ‘within a few weeks’. They stated that, without “adequate recognition” for the building, it was unlikely that Trump would oversee the refurbishment or “lead the financial rescue of the Centre”.

The warnings highlight a financial crisis documented by the Washington Post last month. Internal accounts and forecasts showed that by May, the centre expected to have received only around $124 million of the $220 million in revenue projected for the financial year ending this month, with an estimated deficit of $23 million even after substantial spending cuts. The centre’s executives attributed the institution’s financial problems to the previous management and claimed that Trump’s name had attracted new donors. However, confidential financial documents show that ticket sales and fundraising plummeted after the board of trustees added Trump’s name to the building in December.

In the ruling handed down in May, Cooper ruled that only Congress could rename the Kennedy Centre and ordered the removal of Trump’s name, months after political leaders had affixed it above that of John F. Kennedy. In the same ruling, Cooper temporarily blocked a previous attempt to close the building, finding that the board of trustees had acted on the basis of insufficient information and had not adequately assessed the consequences. He did, however, leave them the option to reconsider the decision following a more thorough analysis. The board of trustees did so in August, re-approving a closure of approximately two years and voting separately to affix the inscription ‘Restored and renovated by President Donald J. Trump’ to the façade.

Today, members of the board of directors met again to consider the possibility of closing the main building for renovation work. Management states that new evidence has made the closure urgent. During a storm on 4 September, a section of plaster from the ceiling measuring approximately 1.2 by 1.5 metres broke away in the main lobby and fell some 18 metres. No one was injured. Inspectors subsequently identified at least seven other areas showing visible water damage, according to documentation prepared by the centre’s management.

On Monday, some areas of the Kennedy Centre had already been cordoned off. The windows of the souvenir shops were covered with paper, and a warning sign blocked a series of doors. Inside the exhibition dedicated to John F. Kennedy, Kennedy’s ‘We choose to go to the Moon’ speech was being played in an empty hall. The ticket office was still open, but the centre had no performances scheduled in the main building. Centre officials say that, following the closure, the programme will continue at the Reach complex, located near the main building, and at other external venues, including performances by the National Symphony Orchestra. The Kennedy Centre Honors and the Mark Twain Prize will also be moved elsewhere whilst the main building is being refurbished.