The Name as a Trophy – How Trump Appropriates the Kennedy Center and Much of the Family Pushes Back

What is happening here is less a cultural policy decision than a display of power. A president who reshapes a board according to his own preferences, removes critics, installs loyal partisans and then allows himself to be honored by that very circle presents himself as surprised and honored. That Donald Trump claims he was “surprised” when the Kennedy Center was renamed after him appears not only implausible, but reveals a striking degree of detachment from reality - or a remarkable brazenness in dealing with public institutions.

The resistance comes, of all places, from within the Kennedy family itself. Kerry Kennedy, president of the Robert & Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center, makes it unmistakably clear that Donald Trump stands for the opposite of the values John F. Kennedy represented politically and morally. Justice, peace, equality, dignity, diversity and compassion were not decorative terms, but lived political convictions. Trump, by contrast, has over the past year deliberately targeted artists, journalists and comedians, restricted free expression and pushed the historical achievements of others out of public memory. His name, Kennedy argues, has no place here.

Kerry Kennedy (@KerryKennedyRFK)

(1/2) (1/2) President Trump and his administration have over the past year suppressed free expression, targeted artists, journalists and comedians, and erased the history of Americans whose contributions made our nation better and more just.

(2/2) (2/2) President Kennedy proudly stood for justice, peace, equality, dignity, diversity and compassion for those who suffer. President Trump stands in opposition to these values, and his name should not be placed alongside President Kennedy’s.

Maria Shriver also finds clear words. It is beyond imagination, she says, that Trump believes he can attach his name to a memorial honoring her uncle - and just as disturbing that he apparently considers this legitimate. Her brother Tim Shriver calls the renaming an insult to a president who did not instrumentalize culture, but supported it. John F. Kennedy brought the arts into the White House not to elevate himself, but to give them space. The idea that Trump might next seek to rename New York’s international airport or other memorial sites is bitter enough to seem not entirely far-fetched.

Tim Shriver (@TimShriver)

Perhaps the Board is not aware that the Kennedy Center IS the memorial to President John F. Kennedy of the United States. Would one rename the Lincoln Memorial? Or the Jefferson Memorial? That would be an insult to great presidents. This is also an insult to a great president.

Regardless of this short-sighted action, it is and remains the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

The criticism is not limited to the family. Derrick Johnson, president and CEO of the NAACP, poses the central question: what achievement could possibly justify placing Donald Trump on the same level as John F. Kennedy? Kennedy led the nation to the moon, advanced key civil rights legislation and helped stabilize the world at the brink of nuclear war. Trump, by contrast, is primarily engaged in self-promotion. He fuels international conflicts, deepens social divisions and drives up the cost of living and unemployment. Placing his name on an institution like the Kennedy Center, Johnson argues, is simply shameful.

“National Memorial”

“Section 11. The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, as designated by this Act, shall be the sole national memorial to the late John Fitzgerald Kennedy within the City of Washington and its environs.

Section 2. In addition to the amendments made by the first section of this Act, it is further provided that any designation or reference to the National Cultural Center in any other law, map, regulation, document, record or other writing of the United States shall be deemed to be a designation or reference to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.”

Signatures:
John W. McCormack
Speaker of the House of Representatives

Carl Hayden
President pro tempore of the Senate

Image top left: The groundbreaking ceremony by President Lyndon B. Johnson on December 2, 1964 - the opening, however, did not take place until 1971.

Politically, the move is also highly controversial. House Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries calls the renaming a disgrace and points out that the board lacks any parliamentary authority to do so. That members of a board handpicked by Trump would submit themselves to a president whose approval ratings are declining nationwide and whose governing record is increasingly under scrutiny, Jeffries says, is a poor showing. He speaks of submission - and of a conception of power that does not respect institutions, but exploits them.

Trump himself responds, as so often, with self-praise. The board, he says, is “very respected,” and he feels honored. That he previously reshaped this board at will, dismissed unwelcome members and installed loyal allies, he ignores. So too the fact that he subsequently had himself elected chairman. The sequence of events is transparent, and the claim of surprise borders on the absurd.

In the end, this episode says more about Donald Trump than about the Kennedy Center. It is not about art, not about remembrance, not about history. It is about ownership. About the urge to place one’s own name even where it neither belongs nor is wanted. That the legacy of John F. Kennedy should be used for this purpose makes the episode not only bigger - but humiliating.