Trump announces Kennedy Center closure after judge stops him naming it after himself

US PRESIDENT DONALD Trump announced the Kennedy Center will close down immediately after a judge ruled his name cannot be added onto the famed arts institution’s exterior.

Shortly after beginning his second term, Trump installed himself as chairman of the centre, which is named in honour of late president John F. Kennedy.

The board voted in December to call it the “Trump-Kennedy” Center.

Trump said on social media that the centre’s board voted “almost unanimously” to close for emergency renovations and that it won’t reopen at all if higher courts don’t back the name change.

He warned the “very large and complex” repairs at the building in Washington cannot begin until a higher court rules on whether the centre can be renamed after himself.

“If the ruling is a negative one, which it should not be, and is not overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court, the Reconstruction and the Renovation of The Kennedy Center will not take place,” Trump said on his Truth Social network.

US federal Judge Christopher Cooper previously ordered Trump’s name removed from the exterior and overturned the board’s decision to rename the institution.

Cooper ruled on Tuesday that Trump’s name cannot be added back, rebuking the centre for trying to circumvent his earlier order.

“Simply put,” wrote Cooper in his decision, the board “cannot install memorials for President Trump or anyone or anything else at the Kennedy Center without Congress’s blessing.”

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The ruling came as the board met to consider a shutdown of the centre, citing fiscal and safety concerns.

Last month, the board moved forward with a plan to add new signage to the building that would read “renovated and restored by President Donald J. Trump”.

Cooper said that plan was in violation of his previous ruling.

Trump and his chosen leaders of the Kennedy Center have argued that its main building, which was constructed in the 1960s, is in a state of dangerous disrepair.

As evidence of the safety problems, the president pointed to a recent incident in which a piece of the ceiling tumbled to the ground following a storm.

“If the Building were open, innocent people would have been killed,” he wrote in a post on Truth Social before the judge’s ruling.

“The Board of The Kennedy Center has strongly voted to save it, and they know I’m the only one who can do so, because I have the ability to raise the money, and the ability to construct – that few others have,” Trump said.

Last month, as part of court proceedings, the Trump administration warned that the centre may need to be demolished if its plans to renovate the building were blocked.

The venue is well-known for hosting the Kennedy Center Honors each year, a gala that presents lifetime achievement awards to legendary artists, actors and musicians.

A host of artists cancelled concerts at the venue in response to Trump’s takeover, while US media has reported that Kennedy Center ticket sales have plummeted.