The Trump administration is, for the first time, threatening the demolition of the Kennedy Center if the arts institution isn’t allowed to follow its plans for the site, including adding President Donald Trump’s name to the front of the building.
“Without those efforts, the Center will deteriorate further into an unsafe, decrepit structure that will be required to be taken down, with a determination to follow on what to build on the site, such as a large outdoor amphitheater overlooking the Potomac River that has been proposed, by some, for many years,” Justice Department attorney Brantley T. Mayers wrote in a court filing on Monday.
The filing notes that any potential outdoor amphitheater would “fail to adequately honor” President John F. Kennedy, “but would be simpler and more economical to build, operate, and maintain.”
The DOJ attorneys called the Kennedy Center “structurally unsound, fundamentally unsafe, and embarrassing to the Nation’s Capital.”
They said the center’s board, which was handpicked by self-appointed chairman Trump, “recognizes that President Trump’s efforts and prestige provide the sole hope for the Center’s financial survival, and structural renewal.”
“The Board also underscores, and the undisputed evidence demonstrates, that without the prominent recognition of The Trump Administration, and President Trump’s efforts, the donors will not contribute, and the Center will continue to be in a financial and structural death spiral. The Trump Administration, and President Donald J. Trump, should, therefore, be given the respect and dignity of acknowledgement,” the filing says.
It notes that Trump “obtained $258 million in funding from Congress for capital restoration, and has marshalled a new donor base to finance an endowment for the Center,” but does not say what has happened to that money.
The filing makes a dramatic twist in the monthslong saga to renovate the historic arts institution, which has faced multiple legal challenges and criticism from Democrats, musicians and members of the Kennedy family.
This language is a shift from what Kennedy Center Executive Director Matt Floca has used in recent months to describe what the board has said are necessary renovations. Floca has said the renovations would include a “total replacement of stage lifts and rigging systems” and wide-ranging electrical work and leak prevention that could be completed within two years if the facility was shut down during the renovations.
He said in a court filing earlier this year that the “exterior of the Center’s main building will not be materially affected” and “the planned construction, renovation, and renewal efforts will not tear down the Center to its structural steel.”
A spokesperson for the center said Tuesday that the language in the filing “describes a hypothetical scenario of what could happen if the center’s desperately needed renovation is blocked by partisan interests.”
A center official had previously said the facility would not be gutted.
“You’re not going to be able to stand in Georgetown and look over the river and see through the building,” the official told reporters during a tour of the facility in April. “That’s not what’s going to happen.”
Mayers’ filing Monday suggested only Trump and his people could save the arts institution.
The administration has “committed an enormous amount of time and energy in planning for the forthcoming renovation and restoration of this building, a task which President Trump, given his unrivaled expertise and experience in real estate and construction, and prominence as President, is uniquely qualified to accomplish,” Mayers wrote Monday in opposition to a motion from Rep. Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, to block the administration from closing the center completely.
“Even Beatty should prefer a healthy, restored Center to a decaying hulk that is doomed to inevitable destruction or collapse. The Court should allow the Board and President Trump to bring the Center back to a level of greatness far higher than it has ever had before. This would be the fitting tribute that President Kennedy so well deserves.”
Beatty has claimed the closure decision was rushed and that board members weren’t presented with enough information about various scenarios before having to vote on it.
The congresswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the DOJ filing.
She is challenging the Trump-appointed board’s renewed bid to add Trump’s name to the front of the building. A judge found the board’s earlier bid to do so was unlawful and compelled it to remove the president’s name from the building, which is supposed to be a “living memorial” to the slain president.
Trump is appealing and the board voted this month to add his name back to the building in a slightly different way- going from the since-stricken “The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts” to “The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Restored and Renovated by President Donald J. Trump.”
There is a hearing scheduled on the planned name change and closure in D.C. on Thursday afternoon. The judge said in his earlier decision that only Congress has the power to rename the site.
