Via The Atlantic: A Shouting Match and an Ultimatum at the Kennedy Center.
Donald Trump has given the federal judiciary an ultimatum: Let him put his name on the Kennedy Center, or he won’t save it.
As incredible as that would sound in a normal timeline, we all know that this is exactly how the current POTUS behaves.
Indeed, let’s go to the source:
Allow me to highlight the following: “The closing will take place immediately, however, the Renovation and Reconstruction, which is a very large and complex job, cannot begin until such time as the D.C. Circuit rules on the Board’s approved name.”
The name, in question, is Trump’s.
Let us be clear: Trump caused the current financial crisis for the Center by first taking it over and chasing away performers who would have generated revenue, and then by closing it entirely in a fit of pique over the naming issue.
Back to The Atlantic:
That threat came after a federal judge, Christopher Cooper, today blocked yet another effort to add the president’s name to the building. Moments later, Trump virtually joined a Kennedy Center board meeting, at which he slammed Cooper’s decision and lashed out at Representative Joyce Beatty—the ex officio board member challenging his overhaul of the institution in court—according to a person with knowledge of the meeting, who spoke with me on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal proceedings.
It’s a good thing that he doesn’t have more important things to attend to, like a failing war in Iran and a trade war with Canada, to name but two things that are radically more important than the Kennedy Center (but, I would hasten to add, are of a theme with the title of this post).
After months defined by empty theaters and canceled shows, the Kennedy Center has become a shadow of the premier performance venue it was just more than a year ago. A Washington Post report this week revealed that the center’s finances are on the brink of collapse and that it could face bankruptcy. But while the institution has diminished, its leaders—and Trump’s allies on the board—have continued to push his plans forward, repackaging their oft-repeated claim that the only way to save it from financial ruin ahead of a two-year renovation is to emblazon it with Trump’s name. The crisis at the Kennedy Center is entangled in a larger effort by Trump to control what Washington looks like—a fight that has taken on higher stakes as his administration evades federal procedures designed to protect historic places from the whims of any one president.
All accurate, but I think it soft-pedals the fact that the canceled shows and empty theaters are directly Trump’s fault and that the board is, with one exception, a Trump-selected set of cronies.
The only thing that I have seen that isn’t directly Trump’s fault is a collapsed ceiling due to a storm earlier this month. But, of course, if the board had been focused on doing its job instead of Trump’s whims, the ceiling might have been attended to.
To keep Trump’s plans for the center alive, the board has already appealed today’s ruling against adding his name to the facade, and Beatty revealed in a court filing to Cooper that leaders had been weighing 10 different ways in which Trump’s name could be added back to the center’s edifice. “The Board seeks to provide multiple options so that President Trump can be legally and appropriately recognized and acknowledged on the facade of the Kennedy Center so that he agrees to carry the burden of managing the renovation and provides the Center with a much required financial rescue,” a resolution that the board had prepared for this week read, though it was later dropped from the board’s agenda so trustees could focus exclusively on closure.
The obsession over putting his name on the building (as well as the utter obsequiousness of the board) is, quite frankly, nauseating.
But, of course, who could have predicted that a name whose main business for the last several decades is putting his name on things would behave this way? I mean, where are we, North Korea?
I would note that, yet again, Trump is ignoring Congress. The AP write-up puts it more succinctly than does The Atlantic:
In a social media post, Trump said the closure was needed for safety repairs. But he said the repairs, which Congress has allocated $257 million to cover, would only happen if the board was allowed to move forward with plans to add his name to the building. A federal judge has twice said that can’t happen without the approval of Congress.
Let’s be clear: he has done deliberate and significant damage to the Center, and is now refusing to use money that had been appropriated to attend to needed repairs because he insists his name should be on the building.
You know, normal president stuff.
Like the Reflecting Pool, this is by no means the most important story about the Trump administration, but it nonetheless is quite illustrative of his naked egoism and his skills in destruction, even as he makes it sound like he is a master builder.
For a timeline of Trump’s destructive involvement with the Kennedy Center, see the following from Broadway World: Inside the Kennedy Center Upheaval: A Complete Timeline.
