FURIOUS Judge RIPS Trump’s NAME OFF Kennedy Center!!!

Added: 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]We got a threepart order just issued by a federal judge, Judge Chris Cooper, coming out of the District of Columbia Federal Court about the Kennedy Center.

[00:00:09]Judge Cooper has ruled that the name must change, that Trump's not able to slap his name on top of the Kennedy Center, the only living memorial that Congress established in the DC area to JFK.

[00:00:22]That's part one. Part two, the board under Donald Trump's thumb that ended up trying to block one of its members from participating in the vote and participating in her own fiduciary duties concerning the public trust that operates the Kennedy Center.

[00:00:41]Representative Joyce Bey, she was improperly blocked. The rules were improperly changed by Donald Trump's new handpicked board and she was cut out of her role in a breach of fiduciary duty concerning the Kennedy Center. That's two. Three, the judge for now is not going to let this building, this operation close in July. He's not convinced that Trump has as his plan to tear down the Kennedy Center the much the way he did the East Wing. But in any event, he also doesn't think that the record is is appropriate for the board to have approved the closure of the Kennedy Center for two years while needed remedial repairs happen.

[00:01:25]Everybody seems to agree that the building needs remedial repairs both acoustically and structurally and to update it. The the issue is did the board under Donald Trump's control seriously consider alternatives to both keep the Kennedy Center open and make the repairs? And the judge said, "No, I don't think you properly evaluated. I'm going to give you another shot. You're not going to be able to close the Kennedy Center at the moment. If you want to reconvene a new hearing, a new meeting, and have uh Representative Beatty there with you, that's one thing.

[00:02:02]But otherwise, no. So takeaway name's not going to change. The um the rules have to go back to where they were to allow Representative Bey to participate.

[00:02:13]And three, the judge is not yet convinced that that facility has to close during repair. Let's get to the bottom of it here on legal AF on Friday.

[00:02:23]Now, the judge started his opinion with a um sort of a recognition of how the Kennedy Center came into being. In 1962, he starts on page one. President Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy presided over a televised fundraiser for what was then the N National Cultural Center that later became the um the Kennedy Center after his assassination. And at that event, which had in addition to Harry Bellfonte, a 7-year-old chist named Yoyo Ma. Amazing. Here's what Kennedy said.

[00:03:04]Art knows no national boundaries. Genius can speak in any tongue and the entire world will hear it and listen. Behind the storm of daily conflict and crisis, the dramatic confrontations, the tumult of political struggle, the poet, the artist, the musician continues the quiet work of centuries, building bridges and experience between peoples, reminding man of the universality of his feelings and desires and despairs, and reminding him that the forces that unite are deeper than those that divide. I am certain that after the dust of centuries has passed over our cities, we too will be remembered not for the victories or defeats in battle or in politics, but for our contribution to the human spirit. Judge Cooper goes on to say that after the assassination, Congress with its organic statute chose to honor President Kennedy's commitment to the arts a year after his assassination by redesating that cultural center, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as a living memorial dedicated to that one president, not to Donald Trump. Now, after you went through in 91 pages, all of the procedural issues, and I'm going to put up this this memorandum opinion for you to read, really eloquently written and analyzed up on Legal AF Substack for paid members. Here's what I gave you.

[00:04:25]The three rulings. One, name comes down.

[00:04:29]you there's no there's no world in which under that statute that Congress use to create the Kennedy Center does some other president or person gets to slap his name on it. It's a desecration of the of not only the spirit of the statute but the literal language of the statute and the judge is not having it.

[00:04:48]as to judge uh to representative Bey who ran into court as the plaintiff. Not only did he find she had standing personal injury as a trustee trying to um trying to perform her trust duties.

[00:05:03]uh but that she's not able to discharge her attempts to protect as a the fiduciary or fiduciary duties to protect those under the trust if you will of the public that she was appointed to defend.

[00:05:19]Fiduciary duty is very very interesting.

[00:05:21]I studied it quite extensively in law school and it's often a gap filler if you can't find a statute. The concept of who is a fiduciary and who what fiduciary obligations they have to somebody else is very important in the law. So for instance in particular you've got um if somebody is in a a position of trust they've been entrusted with certain obligations and there's a beneficiary where there's somebody who's um there's a power imbalance. there's a a person who's in need of protection and this trustee has been appointed for that purpose. What do you have at the end?

[00:06:01]You have a fiduciary relationship, a duty of loyalty, a duty to avoid self-deing, a duty to look out for that party who the fiduciary has been appointed to protect. And that's the argument here. This is a trustee fiduciary analysis by Judge Cooper.

[00:06:19]Here's how he concludes in his uh n in the 90th page uh down to the end in his order.

[00:06:28]Um and again highlights you can't change the rules. She has to be able to vote and participate in the voting. You also the name comes off and as of right now you can't kick everybody out and stop doing programming and performances at the Kennedy Center starting in July. He left open the door that if they get a proper meeting on proper rules and Bey participates that he may reconsider. But right now in the record, he's not going to do that. Uh at least for now. Let me read to you the conclusion of the judge.

[00:06:59]Page 90. In the words of President Kennedy, artists do the quiet work of centuries behind the storm of daily conflict and crisis. They educate, they entertain, and move us.

[00:07:12]The Kennedy Center is one of the foremost of those institutions.

[00:07:17]At some point, the lofty heights of artistic performance collide with the gritty realities of arts and facilities management. The Kennedy Center is legally speaking a trust instrumentality belonging to the American people governed by a board of trustees. The board must also maintain the Kennedy Center in good repair and they have obligations as common law trustees to fulfill various statutory directives related to arts programming and education. They got to do both. They got to balance both. The Kennedy Center board, the judge continues, has wide discretion to steward the institution in service of its various responsibilities.

[00:07:55]Right. The court has concluded page 91 that the board overstepped its bounds statutory bounds by unilaterally renaming the Kennedy Center after President Trump. Uh their decision violates the Congress's mandate. The board also overstepped its statutory bounds by unilaterally stripping exeicio trustees of any right to vote on trust matters.

[00:08:20]Finally, the court is preliminarily persuaded that the board's March 16th vote to close the Kennedy Center is a dereliction of its common law derived duty of prudence. The current record reveals that the board rendered this ill-informed and seemingly pre-ordained decision without regard for how it would accomplish its full array of statutory responsibilities. Translation: Trump ordered his handpicked board to close the Kennedy Center, mainly because he was embarrassed by the lack of programming, people willing, artists willing to perform with Trump's name on it. Um and so he's granted the motion for partial summary judgement um and on voting rights and he he's allowing a preliminary injunction for now about the uh closure uh and that is his order. Let me show you uh trustee representative Bey so you know what this case is all about. Play the clip. the board cannot do what they've done. And so I think it's important because while it is the Kennedy Center, it goes far beyond that. We witnessed what he did with the West Wing. We watched what he did to dismantle our educational system.

[00:09:40]We watched what he did with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. And it will go on and on. So people must use their voices. and I am using my voice because what they've done is not legal.

[00:09:56]>> So, we're going to continue to follow this fast-moving story. I'm sure that they're going to appeal Judge Cooper to the federal court in the District of Columbia and maybe up to the United States Supreme Court. Make no doubt about it. This judge is on to something.

[00:10:10]We know the reason the Kennedy Center has been shut. It's been shut because Donald Trump was embarrassed by the lack of programming artists coming there to perform under his name. He wants his name on everything and he's not going to be happy that this judge just ordered that it be ripped down. We'll continue to follow it all all here on Legal AF until my next report. This is Michael.

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