President Donald Trump shared an ominous photo of himself in the presidential box at the Kennedy Center in a late-night Truth Social post, after earlier fantasizing about renaming the center after himself.
Shared as a quote post with no caption, the image was added to his earlier post praising the “GREAT Nominees for the TRUMP/KENNEDY CENTER, whoops, I mean, KENNEDY CENTER, AWARDS,” which will be announced on Wednesday.
Trump has sought to redesign the iconic Kennedy Center in his own image in a number of ways since becoming president, including by appointing himself chairman of the board, firing several board members, and installing his allies in their place.
He has also previously sought to ensure the center stages “non-woke musicals” like Cats, and complained that the center’s annual Kennedy Center Honors has failed to sufficiently honor his friends and political supporters in the past.
The president even specifically floated Rocky actor and Trump ally Sylvester Stallone as a possible nominee during a meeting with the Kennedy Center board in March.
“We’ll go slightly more conservative, if you don’t mind, with some of the people,” Trump said at the time while speaking about who to honor in future, according to the Washington Post. “There are people out there that would not be considered that are much bigger stars than the ones that were being honored.”
Sources also told CBS News that the center may be scrapping the famous rainbow-colored ribbons it bestows upon lifetime achievement honorees.
Trump will travel to the Kennedy Center on Wednesday—the same day the recipients of this year’s honors will be publicly announced. The Center appeared to gave hints about who will be nominated in a social media post saying: “A country music icon, an Englishman, a New York City Rock band, a dance Queen and a multi-billion dollar Actor walk into the Kennedy Center Opera House…”
Last month, Republicans in Congress began working to rename the Kennedy Center’s Opera House in honor of First Lady Melania Trump before following it up with a bill that would rename the center in honor of the president, removing President John F. Kennedy’s name from the center entirely.
This suggestion drew significant criticism, including from JFK’s grandson, Jack Schlossberg, who wrote on Instagram, “Trump is obsessed with being bigger than JFK, with minimizing the many heroes of our past, as if that elevates him. It doesn’t.”
In another post, Schlossberg, who was recently appointed to the America 250 Commission that oversees plans for the country’s 250th birthday celebrations, argued that the law prohibits the renaming of the center.
“Plain reading of statute makes clear: YOU CAN’T DO THAT,” he wrote, before jokingly offering to help him change the center’s name if he would release the Epstein files.
