Trump Closing Kennedy Center So No More Artists Can Embarrass Him By Refusing To Perform There
Isn't that what 'renovations' really mean?
It looks as if Donald J. Trump, president of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and also, incidentally, the United States of America, will not have to worry about the latest rage among the artistic set canceling upcoming performances at the nation’s crown jewel of an arts space. That’s because he’s closing the Center himself for the next two years. No Kennedy Center, no performers wounding his fragile ego by loudly pulling out of performances or moving their operas elsewhere. Genius!
Trump made the announcement in a long, ranty post (Is there any other kind for him?) on his vanity social media site Sunday night, at the same moment musical artists at the Grammys were using their awards acceptance speeches to denounce his administration for its Gestapo immigration enforcement tactics. Coincidence? We wouldn’t put it past Trump to purposefully interrupt the music industry’s biggest night to tell any musicians and other artists who have pulled out of shows at the Kennedy: You didn’t cancel on Trump, Trump cancelled on you!
In fact, so many headliners have cancelled upcoming shows that we are getting down to lower tier artists, and we assume Trump wishes to avoid two years of headlines like “Spokane-based Mime Troupe Pulls Out of Kennedy Center Performance in Latest Artist Protest of Trump.”
Not that Trump would ever admit any such thing. Officially, the Center will close for massive renovations. According to President Dumb-Dumb, two years of closure is the only way to bring the Kennedy Center to “the highest level of Success, Beauty, and Grandeur.” Weird capitalization is, as always, his:
If you believe this is the reason, we have a symphony to sell you.
We have no doubt Trump would like to redo the Kennedy Center in his grotesque, Atlantic-City-meets-Middle-Eastern-potentate image. He has spent the last year alternately bragging about changes he’s making (painting the Center’s outdoor columns, putting in marble armrests in the larger theaters, slapping his own fucking name above John F. Kennedy’s and referring to the place as the Trump Kennedy Center) and complaining that the whole complex is a dump that’s about to fall in on itself, with broken elevators and rats and crumbling parking garages and who knows what other horrors.
So speculation on social media turned immediately to the possibility that Trump is going to raze the Kennedy Center and build a new one, much like he knocked down the East Wing of the White House so he could build his stupid ballroom. A close reading of his announcement could bring one to that conclusion:
[I]f we don’t close, the quality of Construction will not be nearly as good, and the time to completion, because of interruptions with Audiences from the many Events using the Facility, will be much longer. The temporary closure will produce a much faster and higher quality result!
The Kennedy Center has a boatload of performing arts spaces, and it would not be the first building to undergo a major renovation while staying partially open. There is an entire separate facility, the REACH, that has ten performing arts spaces and was part of a $250 million expansion and just opened in 2019. We find it hard to believe that genius builder Donald Trump can’t figure out a way around this problem.
Granted, it is possible — likely, even — that doing the project in stages would push its completion past the end of Trump’s presidency in early 2029. At that point, all bets about the Center’s future are off. The next Democratic administration is not going to finish the renovation and then invite Trump back for some sort of grand opening where he gets to bask in the glory. Hell, at least one member of the Kennedy family has already promised to chisel his name off the building the minute he leaves office.
No, if Trump wants to enjoy a ton of congratulatory ass-kissing from the same sycophants who turned out last week for the premiere of the documentary about Melania, he must get the work completed before his presidency ends.
The gaseous lickspittle Trump installed to run the Kennedy Center, Ric Grenell, announced on X that he’s so very, very grateful to be part of this goatfuck:
We are LOLing so hard at the idea Trump has a reputation for delivering projects that are “beautifully finished.” We’ve seen examples of his design sense, and beautiful is not the word that comes to mind. Grotesque, tawdry, garish, vulgar, tasteless, graceless … those are the words that come to mind.
[C]losing the Center just makes sense - it will enable us to better invest our resources, think bigger and make the historic renovations more comprehensive.
Yeah, they’re razing it.
One might ask, where is Congress in all of this? The $257 million that Grenell refers to was part of last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill, and was designated for “capital repairs” and restoration. Which means some of it has likely already been spent. Based on the constantly escalating cost of the White House ballroom — which was up over $400 million the last time we looked — we’re guessing any massive renovation-slash-rebuilding of the Kennedy Center is going to cost at least that much, depending on how much of it Trump is finding ways to siphon off.
Will Congress give Trump more money for this vanity project? If the Democrats win in November, it seems a lot less likely. Yet another reason for him to get started now, when the Republicans are in control and he can squeeze them for the funding.
At least one recent mystery is now solved for us. A few days ago, the Center’s new senior vice president of artistic planning announced he had left the job after less than two weeks. That seemed rather abrupt, even with all the artists who have cancelled performances. But now we understand: it is impossible to do any artistic planning if there are going to be zero artists for the next two years.
[WaPo]
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Ladies and Gentlemen, we have now entered the "I can too break all my toys if I want to" portion of the Trump's presidency.
As a refresher, remember, Trump considers anything that exists in the world to be "his toy" . . .
“Spokane-based Mime Troupe Pulls Out of Kennedy Center Performance in Latest Artist Protest of Trump.”
A silent protest with one-fingered salutes.