WASHINGTON — Rep. Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, asked a federal court Friday to block President Donald Trump’s plan to close the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts for two years starting this summer for what Trump has called a “complete rebuilding.”
Beatty, an ex officio member of the center’s board who has already sued Trump seeking to remove his name from the venue, amended her lawsuit, warning that Trump could be planning a surprise demolition of the center.
“President Trump’s own words indicate that he is planning to demolish the existing Kennedy Center building,” said Beatty’s suit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. “To state the obvious, Congress has not authorized either closing the center or conducting a ‘complete rebuilding.’”
The suit cited the sudden demolition of the White House’s East Wing last year in Trump’s drive to build a ballroom there.
Beatty is represented by Norman Eisen, a White House ethics counsel in the Obama administration and the chair of the group Democracy Defenders Action, and Nathaniel Zelinsky of the Washington Litigation Group.
“The president cannot shut down and demolish the Kennedy Center without congressional authorization — and he cannot silence dissenting trustees like Joyce Beatty who are fighting to protect this national treasure,” Eisen and Zelinsky said in a statement.
Liz Huston, a White House spokesperson, defended the president’s plans for the Kennedy Center, saying he was “transforming it into a welcoming destination that everyone can enjoy under his leadership.”
“While the Democrats neglected the Trump-Kennedy Center for years, President Trump immediately stepped up to rescue and revitalize the institution,” she said after the amended lawsuit was filed, adding: “Only deranged Democrats could oppose these efforts.”
Trump has not made clear his plans for construction, but he has insisted he will not demolish the center.
“I’m not ripping it down,” Trump said last month. “I’ll be using the steel. So we’re using the structure, we’re using some of the marble, and some of the marble comes down.”
Since returning to office, Trump has aggressively sought to reshape the center, installing himself as chair, stacking its board with his allies and trying to purge it of what he has called “woke” programming. The changes have caused artists and audiences to flee.
This article originally appeared in .
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