By Mike Scarcella

WASHINGTON, Sept 15 (Reuters) – A U.S. federal judge on Tuesday again blocked the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts in Washington from inscribing President Donald Trump’s name on its facade, dealing the Republican president a fresh setback in his effort to reshape the iconic cultural institution.

U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper in Washington issued an order temporarily halting the center’s latest proposal to put Trump’s name on the memorial to Kennedy, the U.S. president who was assassinated in 1963.

In addition, Cooper said the center’s board cannot proceed with plans to rename the campus where it sits the “President Donald J. Trump Plaza.”

“Simply put, defendants cannot install memorials for President Trump or anyone or anything else at the Kennedy Center without Congress’ blessing,” Cooper wrote in an order issued shortly before the center’s board was scheduled to vote on Trump’s plan to shut down the famed performing arts venue for two years of repairs and renovations.

The board, composed of Trump appointees with Trump himself serving as president, has argued that adding Trump’s name in honor of his efforts was necessary to ensure his continued commitment to its survival.

“The Board understands that without such appropriate recognition it is unlikely that President Trump will provide the fundamental oversight of the renovation of the main building and lead the fiscal rescue of the Center,” the board wrote in a draft resolution ahead of the meeting.

Trump’s campaign to remake the center is part of his broader effort to leave his cultural and aesthetic mark on the U.S. capital, including a large new ballroom to replace the White House East Wing he ordered demolished, a troubled renovation of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and a planned “triumphal arch” near the nation’s main cemetery honoring its war dead.

Tuesday’s ruling came in a lawsuit filed by Democratic U.S. Representative Joyce Beatty, who serves on the center’s board by virtue of her position in Congress.

Cooper had previously ordered the center in May to remove Trump’s name from the building after the center changed its marble facade in December to read “The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.” At that time, Cooper also blocked the center from closing down, finding that the board had not adequately considered the consequences.

Workers stripped Trump’s name from the center in June and left the exterior masked by scaffolding and a white tarpaulin.

BOARD PLANS TO HONOR TRUMP

The board was expected to vote at Tuesday’s meeting on immediately closing the center for an estimated two years of renovations to the main building, which the board says has crumbling ceilings from water damage.

In a social media post on Tuesday, Trump said a “large piece of concrete and steel” fell from a hallway ceiling and that “innocent people would have been killed” if the building had been open at the time.

“We have already wasted more than 6 months “playing around” in Court,” Trump wrote.

The board had also been expected to take up a second resolution to add Trump’s name to the exterior marble “below the name of the center” to credit him for planned renovations, according to court filings on Monday.

But attorneys at the U.S. Justice Department, which is representing the center in court, said in an overnight court filing that the board’s meeting would focus solely on the center’s closure due to the “recently exacerbated structural emergencies.”

In an earlier vote on August 13, the board signed off on the addition of an inscription honoring Trump and renaming the center’s plaza after Trump.

The 10 options for how the president’s inscription could be rendered included: “A Legacy protected through the Generosity of President Donald J. Trump” and “Renovation, Restoration, and support by President Donald J. Trump.”  

The draft resolution also said the center’s finances are dire, and it will be unable to honor its payroll obligations or routine maintenance contracts “within a matter of weeks.” 

After Trump began exerting more direct control over the Kennedy Center last year, artists canceled performances in protest, the Washington National Opera and the National Symphony Orchestra were forced to find other venues, and revenue cratered. 

(Reporting by Mike Scarcella and Bo Erickson in Washington; Writing by Joseph Ax; editing by Scott Malone and Aurora Ellis)


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