Judge blocks latest bid to add Trump’s name to Kennedy Center

By Tierney Sneed, CNN

(CNN) — A federal judge has blocked the latest attempt by the Kennedy Center board of trustees to add President Donald Trump’s name to the building.

US District Judge Casey Cooper said a proposal to add an inscription thanking the president for renovating and restoring the institution’s edifice, along with a move to rename the center’s campus after him – “bucks a federal court order and a statute Congress enacted.”

The ruling was issued on Tuesday just before the Kennedy Center’s board of trustees, which is stacked with Trump allies, was set to meet.

The meeting’s agenda initially included additional proposals for putting Trump’s name on the building, but those items were removed from the schedule so that the board could focus solely on whether the center should be shut down for repairs – a matter that was also discussed in Cooper’s courtroom at a hearing earlier on Tuesday.

“Simply put, Defendants cannot install memorials for President Trump or anyone or anything else at the Kennedy Center without Congress’s blessing,” Cooper wrote.

An August 13 proposal adopted by the board would have affixed the text “Restored and Renovated by President Donald J. Trump” to the center’s facade. After initially planning to add the inscription this month, the board’s lawyers told Cooper it would wait until October 8 so he could rule on the legality of such a move.

The legal wrangling is the latest development in a lawsuit brought by Ohio Rep. Joyce Beatty, a Democrat who serves as an ex-officio member of the board. She previously secured from Cooper an order blocking the board’s move to change the Kennedy Center’s name to include Trump, and to close the center completely as repair work was done on it.

In remarks outside of court before Cooper’s ruling, Beatty said she would oppose any new attempts by the board to put his name on the building.

Trump, meanwhile, blasted the judge on social media in anticipation that Cooper would rule against the name-change and would prevent the Kennedy Center from being closed to address, in Trump’s words, “Building Safety.”

“A very hostile and conflicted Judge (What else is new?) seems like he won’t let that happen, in which case, unfortunately, the Building is destined to doom,” Trump said on Truth Social.

Cooper held off on ruling on one part of the August 13 resolution – a proposal adding an additional inscription honoring “The Trump Kennedy Center Fund” once $100 million was raised by the endowment.

Since the fund has not raised any money yet, ruling on that proposal was “premature,” Cooper said. Instead, he is ordering notification if that fundraising threshold is met, with at least 60 days notice before the text can be added.

It is possible that Tuesday’s ruling will be quickly appealed by the Trump administration.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

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