Rick Wilson, a Republican strategist, wrote a best selling book called “Everything Trump touches dies.” One of the more visible deaths may be the Kennedy Center. David Smith penned an article in The Guardian called “Seized, subverted, shuttered: a year in Trump’s assault on the Kennedy Center” that is a sad story about this American institution.*
Here are a few paragraphs from the piece starting with its subtitle:
“Since a presidential post on Truth Social the Washington DC arts hub has lost its leadership, had its name changed and will now be closed for years.
The Brentano String Quartet had finished their performance when a special guest dropped in backstage: the US supreme court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. ‘We thanked her for everything she had done for our country,’ recalls violinist Mark Steinberg. ‘It was a nice moment.’
The year was 2016 and the place was the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington. Fast forward a decade and old certainties have been shaken: Ginsburg is dead, Donald Trump is president and the Kennedy Center has become a case study in how a seemingly solid American institution can quickly unravel.
The Brentano String Quartet were due to perform there last week but cancelled their show, citing Trump’s hostile takeover of the complex. Steinberg explained: ‘I would have felt ashamed to walk out on stage there. I can’t quite bring myself to go into the building at this point.
‘It would be such a luxury to make art in a vacuum and that’s what I yearn for but that’s not possible right now. Had we appeared there, in my eyes, that would be a way of condoning everything that’s happening and I couldn’t stomach that.’
…. During Trump’s first term, he ignored the proudly non-partisan complex and did not attend the annual Kennedy Center Honors. But, as in so many other ways, his second term is very different. His takeover of the centre began, perhaps inevitably, with a Truth Social post one year ago, on 7 February 2025.
Trump wrote that he was immediately terminating ‘multiple individuals’ from the center’s board of trustees ‘who do not share our vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture.’ He said he would soon announce a new board, ‘with an amazing Chairman, DONALD J. TRUMP!’
He also criticized the centre’s past programming. ‘Just last year, the Kennedy Center featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth – THIS WILL STOP. The Kennedy Center is an American Jewel, and must reflect the brightest STARS on its stage from all across our Nation. For the Kennedy Center, THE BEST IS YET TO COME!’”
Many artists have been voting with their feet, in essence, telling the “amazing “Chairman “no thank you.” Given their artistic nature and collaborative bent, entertainers tend to be more accepting of diversity. So, they do not like the anti-diversity thinking wielded by the incumbent president. And, when you cannot schedule the best talent, there is not much of a show to watch.
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* Per an AI search summary: “As of February 2026, the Kennedy Center has not yet been shuttered, but President Trump announced on February 1, 2026, that it will close for two years starting July 4, 2026. The planned closure is for, in his words, a ‘Construction, Revitalization, and Complete Rebuilding’ of the venue into a new entertainment complex.”
Note: This two year close came as a surprise to the Board as the institution has been scheduling acts.
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