Trump attacks judges over Kennedy Center, White House ballroom rulings

Donald Trump widened his fight over Washington’s cultural landmarks this weekend, attacking federal judges and musicians as courts and artists pushed back against his imprint on the Kennedy Center, the White House and a separate America 250 celebration. The clash has become less about individual rulings than about who gets to define patriotism, and who decides which public institutions can safely claim the nation’s semiquincentennial.

At the Kennedy Center, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper ordered Trump’s name removed from the facade, digital signage and official materials within 14 days after finding that the board had acted unlawfully when it added his name in December 2025. The official title had briefly become The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. Cooper also blocked the center from carrying out a planned two-year closure for renovations, though he said the work could still proceed if the board revisited the decision properly. After the ruling, Trump said he wanted Congress to take responsibility for the institution and said his administration would transfer control of it to Congress.

Trump is also fighting in court over a proposed $400 million ballroom planned to replace part of the East Wing of the White House site. Judge Richard Leon blocked above-ground construction on April 16, but allowed below-ground work tied to national-security facilities to continue. The Trump administration has appealed, and the National Trust for Historic Preservation is the plaintiff in the case. Together, the two disputes place Trump at odds with judges over two of the capital’s most symbolic civic spaces, one built for the arts and the other for presidential pageantry.

That same political tension is now spreading into the country’s 250th anniversary celebrations. Freedom 250, a nonprofit backed by Trump and allies, has organized the Great American State Fair as a separate effort from the congressionally blessed America 250 commission. By Friday morning, at least five acts had dropped out: Bret Michaels, Martina McBride, Morris Day and the Time, The Commodores and Young MC. Michaels said the event had become “much more divisive” than what he agreed to and cited threats to fans, crew and family. Young MC said the artists were never told about political involvement and hoped to perform in Washington at a nonpolitical event in the future. McBride said she had been misled into believing the celebration was nonpartisan and meant to unite all 50 states.

The cancellations reflect a wider backlash to Trump’s expanding cultural footprint in Washington, after earlier protests by artists and celebrities outside the Kennedy Center over what they described as threats to free speech and a Trump takeover of the institution. As the nation moves toward its 250th anniversary, the battle is no longer just over venues or event names. It is over whether patriotic celebration can remain broad enough to keep artists, judges and the public inside the same civic tent.