The Kennedy Center has removed President Donald Trump’s name from its website, after a judge ruled the building was illegally renamed after the president without Congressional approval.
However, the president’s name is still on the exterior of “The Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts” – for now. The center’s general counsel told staff in a memo they have until Friday to remove the name.
“To comply with this order, you must immediately change email signatures, letterhead, and other documents to reflect the name as ‘The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts,’ or ‘Kennedy Center’, the memo obtained by CNN said.
“Other changes, such as to templates and forms, signage, brochures, and website pages, must be completed no later than Friday, June 12, 2026.”
It follows the ruling by U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper last month.
“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. Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it,” Cooper wrote.
The arts center has been hit by multiple legal battles since February 2025, when Trump replaced the center’s board with members of his administration and other allies, who then renamed it after the president.
The signage went up on the building the day after the vote, leading the Justice Department to concede in court that the name change must have been premeditated.
The center’s Trump-appointed executive director, Charles Matthew Floca, told the court that stripping the president’s name from the venue would cause “irreparable harm” to its fundraising and development goals.
Floca claims it is not possible to secure the fundraising necessary to refurbish the building without Trump’s name attached.
However, since taking over the Kennedy Center, a number of musicians contracted to play at the venue have cancelled their shows in protest.
The president has called for the judge in the naming case to be impeached.
“Cooper’s wife, Amy Jeffress, who doesn’t use the ‘Cooper’ name because they, as a couple, don’t want people to know that she has a Conflict of Interest with an important Judge, is a Radical Left Democrat, who worked as a Federal Prosecutor and Counselor to Obama Attorney General, Eric Holder,” Trump wrote on Truth Social last month.
“Amy is totally wired into the Left System, from her husband down, and it is impossible for me to be treated fairly. He has a total Conflict of Interest, and should be brought up on charges for not revealing these facts.
“That is why The Kennedy Center will soon be closed, probably never to open again.”
