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Here’s your citation: http://beatty.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/court-reverses-unlawful-renaming-and-halts-shutdown-of-kennedy-center-reaffirming-the-rule-of-law
WASHINGTON, D.C.—U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper issued a ruling reversing the unlawful renaming and halting the planned closure of t
The court also found that the Kennedy Center's board was "derelict" when it voted to close the memorial to President John F. Kennedy for two
Paul Blumenthal at HuffPost:
A federal judge ruled that President Donald Trump cannot slap his own name on the Kennedy Center in a decision released on Friday.
The opinion follows the decision by the Kennedy Center Board of Trustees, stacked with Trump appointees, to rename the memorial to the late President John F. Kennedy to include Trump’s name on Dec. 18, 2025. Trump’s name was added to the building the next day. Then in March, Trump announced on his social media site that the center would close to undergo large-scale renovations. The closure announcement, however, came after a raft of performers canceled shows and ticket sales plummeted in the wake of the boards’ actions. Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio), an ex officio member of the Kennedy Center board, filed suit in December 2025 to challenge the board’s actions both renaming the center and closing it for two years. The decision released on Friday by Judge Christopher Cooper largely sided with Beatty’s challenge. “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,” the decision by Judge Christopher Cooper states. “Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it.”
As a result of the decision, Cooper ordered the board to “remove President Trump’s name from the institution’s title, as represented on the façade of the Center, any other physical or digital signage, and official materials.” Kennedy Center President Matt Floca attempted to preempt Cooper’s decision in a Tuesday filing to the court arguing that the removal Trump’s name from the Kennedy Center would leave the center “financially nonviable.” But Cooper dismissed Floca’s filing as “it lacks a factual basis and is grounded on Floca’s unsupported opinion alone.”
[...] “Unless I am free to do what I do better than anyone else, bring this Institution back, physically, financially, and artistically, I have no interest in continuing what could only be a hopeless journey into ‘NEVER NEVER LAND,’” Trump wrote, adding, “I have instructed the Department of Commerce to make all necessary arrangements with Congress to allow a full and complete transfer of this Institution, giving them the responsibility for its Operation, Maintenance, and Management.” In addition to blocking the Kennedy Center from bearing Trump’s name, Cooper’s decision declares that the board was “derelict in discharging the full range of its responsibilities to the Center” when it voted to close the center for two years, beginning on July 6, for repairs. Cooper also found that the board could not exclude ex officio members, like Beatty, from voting on these decisions.
In Beatty v. Trump, Judge Christopher Cooper ruled that Donald Trump’s renaming of the Kennedy Center and the two-year closure for “remodeling” were unlawful acts.
See Also:
The Guardian: US judge orders removal of Trump's name from Kennedy Center
AV Club: Judge rules Trump can't just slap his name on the Kennedy Center
Law Dork (Chris Geidner): Federal judge ends Kennedy Center name change, bars two-year closure plans for now
I constantly see posts about people asking where the Black Mamdanis and AOCs are.
And every time I hear that, I just kinda stop and stare at a wall wide eyed.
Cause I don’t know how to answer that question.
Because, to ask that question in the first place means the person asking is ignoring our incredible Black elected officials.
It has to.
They can’t ask that question if they know who Mayor Brandon Scott is or Reps Lauren Underwood, Joyce Beatty or Sydney Kamlager Dove. And those are just four of hundreds, and I do mean HUNDREDS of examples.
But I don’t want this to be a dissertation, you probably wouldn’t read it if it was, so let me focus on these four.
Mayor Brandon Scott leads Baltimore, Maryland. He has been in office six years now, and the homicide rate is going down every single month. May was the first time in five decades that homicide rate was in the single digits.
He did this through new programs like Group Violence Reduction, which launched in 2022 and established ones like Safe Streets which has been around since 2007.
And he’s not done. He barely considers this an accomplishment because homicides are still happening.
And he’s not going to rest till they aren’t.
Rep Lauren Underwood (IL-14) is 39 years old, but she has been in office since she was 31. At the time she was the youngest Black woman to ever be in Congress. And she ran with that.
Her longest fight has been working to get the Black Maternal Health package to pass the House. And she hasn’t stopped fighting for it. She was a nurse and is disabled herself and that informs everything she fights for.
And she won’t stop fighting for that package till it passes.
Rep Joyce Beatty (OH-03) may be 76, but she is the reason that Trump’s name is off the Kennedy Center, and when the tarp comes down, she will be the reason for that too.
She has been on the Kennedy Center board as an ex officio member (a board member from Congress) since 2019 and when the phone call happened to rename the Center, her line was muted. So she sued, and won.
This is one of the biggest wins against Trump coming from our Democrats in Congress. Cause it didn’t just stop something, it reversed it.
And she will keep filing these lawsuits till the Kennedy Center is restored in full.
And last but certainly not least, Rep Sydney Kamlager Dove (CA-37) is one of my favorite Reps. She is loud and dramatic in the best way possible. She’s not afraid to swear and is constantly trying to raise awareness about how much damage Trump is causing.
She will walk out of hearings to make a point when she thinks they’re unfair, like the June 3 hearing with Marco Rubio.
One of my favorite things from her is her “Is this Shit Legal?” series, where she reminded her audience time and time again of all the illegal things Trump was doing, and highlighted what Dems are doing to stop them.
She explains what’s going on in Congress in words everyone can comprehend, and I will never understand how she’s not one of the people everyone talks about the most.
So, where are the Mamdanis and AOCs? They’re right there. They’re elected already. They’re doing incredible work every single day.
I just wish more people knew their names.
If you wanna change that, the call to action is really simple. Follow more Black electeds on social media and spread their work.
Because they are here and they are Progressive and they are loud and they are fighting.
If you're happy about the Kennedy Center decision thank Joyce Beatty.
@RepBeatty was the plaintiff in the case that made Donald cry and write a 10 page essay about how he was going to abandon the Kennedy Center because they ordered his name taken off of it.
TRUMP’S NAME IS COMING OFF THE KENNEDY CENTER
Kennedy Center staff have been ordered to remove Trump’s name from email signatures, letterhead, documents, and signage by June 12.
A federal judge ruled that the name change was unlawful because Congress created the Kennedy Center and only Congress has the power to rename it. Rep. Joyce Beatty sued after saying she was muted during the board vote when she tried to object.
Trump’s allies had voted to add his name late last year after he became chair of the center, but the rebrand didn’t even make it six months. The ruling landed on John F. Kennedy’s birthday, which is almost too on the nose for a place literally named after him.
TRUMP’S NAME IS COMING OFF THE KENNEDY CENTER Kennedy Center staff have been ordered to remove Trump’s name from email signatures, letterhe
The ruling is a stinging blow for Trump, who has made clear his personal stake in the rebranding and remodeling of the Kennedy Center.
Eagerly awaiting photos of workers removing the Orange One's name from the Kennedy Center. 😁
U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper said the rebranding of the institution that honors President John F. Kennedy as the “Trump-Kennedy Center” violated the clear language of federal law that requires the building to honor “President Kennedy and President Kennedy alone.” The order to revert to the original, longstanding name came as part of a broader ruling that also overturned a plan announced in March to close the center for two years for renovations. Cooper, an Obama appointee, said repairs to the campus can proceed and an outright closure in the future might be lawful if the center’s board is more thoroughly consulted. [ ... ] Cooper’s ruling against Trump’s plans came in a lawsuit brought by Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio), who serves as an ex officio member of the center’s board. She argued in the lawsuit that the Trump administration’s moves illegally deprived her of her power to vote on the closure and remodeling plan, and frustrated board members’ legal duty to maintain a presidential memorial and present arts programming.
Hopefully this will be just the first of many reversals of Trump namings which we'll be seeing.
BTW, this court ruling came on the 109th anniversary of the birth of John F. Kennedy.
Bylaws that would limit voting to Trump-appointed trustees appears to reveal long-held renaming plan
Robert Tait at The Guardian:
The Kennedy Center reportedly adopted bylaws earlier this year that would limit voting to Donald Trump-appointed trustees – a controversial move that appears to reveal the long-held plan to install Trump’s name to the center. The bylaws, in a possible breach of the institution’s charter, were revised in May and specified that board members appointed by Congress, known as ex-officio members, could not vote or count towards a quorum, according to the Washington Post. The new rule was in force when the board voted unanimously on 18 December to add Trump’s name to the center, rebranding the building as the Donald J Trump and the John F Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. The name change has since triggered a wave of protests. Artists have cancelled bookings and members of Congress have vowed to overturn the name change. Joyce Beatty, a Democrat from Ohio, is even suing to reverse it on the grounds that changing the center’s name requires an act of Congress. Trump took over as chair of the board in February, quickly purging sitting members, while installing his supporters – including his longtime foreign policy adviser Ric Grenell, whom he appointed as president of the center. Grenell had been a vocal tribune of Trump’s “America First” ideology, and was not afraid to ruffle feathers during past spells as ambassador to Germany and acting director of national intelligence (he was the first openly gay person to lead the intelligence community).
Just prior to his Kennedy Center appointment, Grenell served as the president’s envoy for special missions, and was involved in securing the release of Americans detained in Venezuela. The center lists 34 presidentially appointed board members and 23 ex-officio members, who by law must include the mayor of Washington DC, head of the library of Congress, and the majority and minority leaders of the Senate. The federal law underpinning the center’s establishment identified ex-officio members as among the venue’s trustees, charged with maintaining it as a memorial to President John F Kennedy, the Post reported.
The Kennedy Center renaming process was done by a rigged rules change to restrict voting on the matter to Donald Trump’s fraudulently-chosen nominees.
President Donald Trump’s handpicked board has voted to rename Washington’s leading performing arts center as the Trump Kennedy Center.
John F. Kennedy's grandson, Jack Schlossberg, spoke out after the Kennedy Center board voted to add President Donald Trump's name to the pre
A planned Christmas Eve jazz concert at the Kennedy Center has been canceled. Musician Chuck Redd, the show's host, says he called off the p
Joyce Beatty seeks to remove the president’s name from the newly minted ‘Trump-Kennedy Center’
Backlash continues over the Trump administration's push to rename the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and include President T
