President Donald Trump suffered another humiliating courtroom defeat as a federal appeals court refused to block a ruling ordering the removal of his name from the Kennedy Center.
In its second rejection of the administration’s request, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said Trump’s lawyers had failed to prove that removing his name would damage fundraising efforts at the iconic performing arts venue, which has faced declining ticket sales and widespread artist cancellations since Trump initiated a MAGA takeover last year.
Trump has argued that removing his name from the building’s exterior would cause “irreparable harm” to fundraising.
But this week’s ruling said the president’s lawyers had failed to provide any evidence for that claim.
The defendants “failed to support this assertion with any specific facts or evidence,” the appeals court said in its ruling. “They offer only the conclusory assertions of the Kennedy Center’s Executive Director that were made in a factually unsupported declaration.”
The court also brushed aside a separate argument that the Kennedy Center could be forced to refund donations if Trump’s name was not restored, noting that the claim had never been presented to the lower court.
Circuit Judges Robert Wilkins and Patricia Millet, who were both appointed by former president Barack Obama, were joined on the panel considering the appeal by Trump-appointee Circuit Judge Gregory Katsas.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
The legal challenge was brought by Ohio Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty, who serves as an ex officio trustee of the Kennedy Center, which is formally known as the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
She said this week’s ruling reaffirms that Trump’s effort to rename the Kennedy Center after himself was “unlawful.”
“Today’s ruling again affirms that this administration’s efforts to rename the Kennedy Center were unlawful,” Beatty said.
“His name no longer desecrates this sacred memorial, which belongs to the American people. Now it is time for the Trump administration to accept this, comply with the law, and take the tarps down,” she added, referring to the large tarps and scaffolding that were installed, obstructing the facade of the building, hours before Trump’s name was due to be removed from the front of the Kennedy Center.
Kennedy Center Executive Director Matt Floca said in a court declaration that the lettering displaying Trump’s name had been taken down, but weeks later the building’s facade remains covered by tarps and scaffolding.
Judge Casey Cooper, who was appointed by Obama in 2014, has directed the Kennedy Center to justify why its exterior signage remains hidden behind tarps and scaffolding.
The order comes after Trump’s name was stripped from both the building and the center’s website under Cooper’s May 29 ruling, which also barred the venue from shutting down for renovations — a decision the Trump administration is expected to appeal.
Trump’s handpicked board at the center voted last December to add his name to the prestigious D.C. venue, and fresh signage went up the next day to rename the building “The Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.”
But Cooper ordered the name removed in May, on the grounds that Trump had failed to seek congressional approval for the name change.
“Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it,” Cooper wrote.
