U.S. President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Washington, D.C., January 29, 2026. REUTERS/Kylie Cooper
President Donald Trump's dogged obsession with stamping his own name on the Kennedy Center, with the New York Times reporting that a federal judge firmly blocked any such changes without congressional approval.
In a new ruling Tuesday, Judge Christopher R. Cooper of the Federal District Court in Washington, D.C., ruled against the efforts to add Trump's name to the venerated institution, stating that no inscription of any kind could be added. The center's board, filled with MAGA loyalists earlier in Trump's second term, has been pursuing various means of adding Trump's name to the building for months, as part of his broader obsession with adding his name and likeness to as many things as possible.
“Simply put, defendants cannot install memorials for President Trump or anyone or anything else at the Kennedy Center without Congress’s blessing,” Judge Cooper wrote. “The board resolution bucks a federal court order and a statute Congress enacted.”
Cooper previously blocked the board's first attempt to rename the center, ordering that the president's name be removed from the facade. The removal was ultimately blocked from public view by a large tarp, which remained up indefinitely as the board searched for a new solution.
"But last month its board voted to restore Mr. Trump’s name in a different form, aggressively testing the judge’s previous order," the Times report detailed. "The resolution approved by the board proposed an inscription under the building’s main signage that would read 'renovated and restored by President Donald J. Trump.' Judge Cooper declined to rule on whether a different inscription — saying 'endowed by The Trump Kennedy Center Fun' — would be allowed because the center said it would not pursue the addition until an endowment fund dedicated to the president raises $100 million."
Trump's attempt to take over the Kennedy Center, both in its name and programming, caused a mass exodus of performers and programs, as well as a steep decline in ticket sales, leaving it at risk of shutting down. In defiance of those realities, lawyers from the Justice Department argued that recognition of Trump was necessary to help the center raise funds and recover financially.
“An order blocking the Board from appropriately recognizing President Trump will cause donors to flee, financial contributions to dry up, and structural rehabilitation to stop,” the lawyers wrote. “There will simply not be the expertise or funding necessary to rebuild and renovate this decimated structure.”