Ousted Kennedy Center boss Rick Grenell has called for people to be jailed for not maintaining the performing arts institution, declaring the venue was a “financial and structural mess” until President Donald Trump came along.
Speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Texas on Friday, Grenell also backed the president’s controversial decision to shut the center down for two years, insisting that it would return “better than ever.”
“I actually think people should go to prison for the deferred maintenance on the Kennedy Center,” Grenell said.
“When you look at what they said that they were going to do, which was to fix the Kennedy Center, they were getting federal dollars to maintain the building. They were not maintaining the building. After 10 years of all of that, the place was literally falling apart.”
He continued with a laundry list of allegations against the center: “Lawsuits from the ceiling falling on cars. Every time there was rain, it poured in through the roof. The sewer system would back up, pipes would burst. I arrived, and we didn’t even have the fountains out front that were able to work, because they were going down into the parking garage and flooding the parking garage.”
The comments are among the most expansive public remarks Grenell has given since he was cast aside by Trump, who instead elevated Matt Floca, a little-known Biden-era facilities chief, to oversee the center’s two-year renovation.
“He’s a pro at construction,” Trump mused during a board meeting at the White House earlier this month—before joking that his new appointee would be fired if he didn’t carry out his explicit plans for the building.
Since then, layoffs have begun, with multiple departments affected—including programming, development, advertising, marketing and the office of the president, according to The Washington Post.
Among those axed were Nick Meade, Grenell’s longtime adviser, and Rick Loughery, the former chairman of the Young Republicans.
The shift came after a tumultuous time, with the Kennedy Center suffering numerous artist cancellations and plummeting ticket sales ever since the president heavily restructured the institution, firing President Deborah Rutter, removing Chairman David Rubenstein, and dismissing half of the board of trustees.
Trump then appointed himself as chairman, slapped his name on the building, and announced plans to renovate the facility in his own image.
But Grenell offered nothing but praise for Trump, telling CPAC how the president inspected the center last year and decided it needed a massive revamp.
“He came over, and we took him to the bowels of the basement, and he saw it immediately, and he said, ‘Wow, this place needs to be fixed,’” Grenell said.
“Some of our engineers were saying we should tear it down and start over, but President Trump said we’re going to fix it.
“And we’ve tried to fix it as we’ve gone along, but the best thing to do is to shut it down, turn it into a construction site for two years, and bring it back better than ever.”
