A federal judge has ordered Donald Trump to remove his name from the John F Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts within 14 days, after ruling that the board of trustees did not have the authority to add it. Trump’s response – a 580-word Truth Social post featuring heavy use of capitals, references to rotting beams, a declaration that “there has never been a President of the United States who has been treated so unfairly by the Courts as I,” and the phrase “NEVER NEVER LAND” – was as measured and proportionate as you would expect.
How we got here
It had been less than six months since Trump arranged for the Kennedy Center – the national performing arts venue named in honour of assassinated President John F Kennedy – to be rebranded as the Trump Kennedy Center, placing his own name above JFK’s.
JFK’s niece, Maria Shriver, said what many were thinking. “It is beyond comprehension that this sitting president has sought to rename this great memorial dedicated to President Kennedy. It is beyond wild that he would think adding his name in front of President Kennedy’s name is acceptable. It is not. Next thing perhaps he will want to rename JFK Airport. The Trump Lincoln Memorial. The Trump Jefferson Memorial. The Trump Smithsonian. Can we not see what is happening here? This is not dignified. This is not funny. It’s downright weird. It’s obsessive in a weird way.”
The artistic community responded swiftly. Issa Rae cancelled her sold-out performance. Pulitzer Prize winner Rhiannon Giddens pulled out, along with Peter Wolf, Low Cut Connie and the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington DC. Lin-Manuel Miranda cancelled the entire Kennedy Center run of Hamilton.
Democratic Representative Joyce Beatty filed a lawsuit. On Friday, Judge Christopher Cooper – appointed by Barack Obama, a fact Trump’s rant mentions in the second sentence – ruled in her favour.
The ruling
Judge Cooper found that the 36-member Board of Trustees, which voted unanimously to add the Trump name, did not have the legal authority to make that addition. Trump’s name must be removed within 14 days.
Bernie Sanders reacted with characteristic concision: “A federal judge just ordered Trump’s name removed from the Kennedy Center because it honors JFK, not Donald Trump. America deserves a president, not a narcissist-in-chief who treats public office as a vehicle for self-promotion and personal enrichment.”
The rant
Trump went to Truth Social. What followed is worth quoting at length because summary does not do it justice.
He opened by identifying Judge Cooper as “appointed by Barack Hussein Obama” – the middle name deployed, as always, as an incantation. He then claimed the Kennedy Center was “going to close in early July for largescale renovations and construction due to years of neglect, decay, and poor maintenance” and that it was “to be transformed by the Trump Administration into the Finest Facility of its kind, anywhere in the World.”
He claimed the Kennedy Center had lost “Hundreds of Millions of Dollars” and in some cases “over 100 Million Dollars a year.” He said he “took great pride in taking over a losing Institution.” He said the “Radical Left would rather see it DIE than have President Trump transform it into something that everyone could be proud of, much as I have done, in many cases, throughout my life.”
Then came the structural allegations. Trump claimed Cooper had been given a presentation by “leading Building and Construction Experts” about how “structurally dangerous the Building is, with rotting beams, parking areas that are subject to collapse, and various other Life and Safety problems” – but “was not swayed.” Cooper, Trump wrote, “should be ashamed of himself.”
The threat that followed was to transfer the building to Congress: “I have no interest in continuing what could only be a hopeless journey into ‘NEVER NEVER LAND.'”
The climax: “There has never been a President of the United States who has been treated so unfairly by the Courts as I but, that’s OK, I will continue to do, what is considered to be, a great job for the wonderful people of our Country.”
He signed off: “President DONALD J. TRUMP.”
Here it is in full:
The specific absurdity
A few observations are warranted.
Trump himself approved the closure for renovation that the judge – in Trump’s telling – is blocking. The judge is simultaneously to blame for the building being too dangerous to stay open AND for wanting it to stay open. These are not compatible criticisms.
The claim that Judge Cooper “wants the Building to, incredibly, remain open and, therefore, dangerous” is presented as an act of reckless judicial vandalism. The building has been open continuously, including during Trump’s own presidency.
“NEVER NEVER LAND” appears to be Trump’s description of what the Kennedy Center will become if he cannot put his name on it. This is a national memorial to an assassinated president. Peter Pan’s fictional realm of eternal childhood is the comparison Trump reached for.
The post is 580 words. For context, the Gettysburg Address is 271 words. Trump used 580 words to complain that a federal judge ruled his name could not go above JFK’s on a building named after JFK.
As we reported in our Barbara Walters 1990 Trump interview piece, the TikToker who described that resurfaced clip as evidence that Trump has “always been exactly who he is” may have had a point. In 1990 he told Walters the Plaza Hotel was a triumph as she informed him his bankers said otherwise. In 2026 he is writing 580 words about Never Never Land because a judge said he cannot put his name above a dead president’s.
