The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts will shut for roughly two years for “Building, Revitalization, and Full Rebuilding,” President Trump introduced on Sunday.
Full closure of the performing arts heart in Washington, D.C., will begin on July 4, Mr. Trump stated in a social media submit. The choice to totally shut the middle over a partial development got here after a 12 months of overview by consultants, the president stated.
“The momentary closure will produce a a lot quicker and better high quality consequence!,” Mr. Trump wrote on Reality Social. “This necessary resolution, primarily based on enter from many Extremely Revered Specialists, will take a drained, damaged, and dilapidated Middle, one which has been in unhealthy situation, each financially and structurally for a few years, and switch it right into a World Class Bastion of Arts, Music, and Leisure, much better than it has ever been earlier than.”
The announcement comes as a number of high-profile performers scheduled to seem on the U.S. capital’s main performing arts venue introduced they had been pulling out following Mr. Trump’s takeover.
It was unclear what the renovations would entail and what precisely Mr. Trump meant by a “Full Rebuilding.” The president final 12 months had a lot of the East Wing of the White Home demolished to make means for a brand new ballroom, the way forward for which is at present the topic of an ongoing lawsuit seeking to halt its construction.
Staffers on the Kennedy Middle advised CBS Information they discovered of renovation plans on Sunday night from Mr. Trump’s social media submit.
“I do not know what any of it means,” stated one senior staffer, granted anonymity as a result of they are not licensed to talk publicly about Kennedy Middle operations.
Mr. Trump on Saturday stated the middle’s closure is topic to approval by Kennedy Middle board members. The president ousted a group of Kennedy Middle board members final February and put in shut allies as replacements, who then voted to call him chair.
In December, the middle’s board voted to rename the organization because the Trump-Kennedy Middle, and the president’s identify was added to the exterior of the building. The transfer drew outrage from Democratic lawmakers, who argued the identify cannot be modified with out laws as a result of the middle was created by Congress.
CBS Information has reached out to the Kennedy Middle for remark.
