Employees at the capital’s national performing arts landmark have been told to erase Donald Trump’s name from the building it briefly shared with John F. Kennedy’s, the Washington Post reports. In an internal memo sent Thursday, the Kennedy Center’s general counsel informed employees they must remove all references to Trump—in outdoor signs, printed materials, the website, and email signatures—by June 12, reverting to “The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts” or simply “the Kennedy Center.” The move is in compliance with a ruling last week by US District Judge Christopher Cooper, who found the board overstepped when, at Trump’s urging, it voted in December to append his name. President Trump’s name went up on the building the next day.
“Remove any references to the ‘Trump-Kennedy Center’ or ‘The Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts,'” the memo says, per NBC News. Cooper had given the center 14 days from May 29 to remove the name of “anyone other than John F. Kennedy.” He wrote in his ruling that “Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it.” The center’s management, which was installed by Trump, had said Cooper’s ruling would be appealed, but the counsel’s memo made no mention of the possibility, per the New York Times.
