President Donald Trump dismissed half the appointed trustees of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts’ board on Feb. 12, 2025. The remaining board members, most of whom he had recently appointed,

On Feb. 7, Trump announced on Truth Social that he would be terminating “multiple individuals from the Board of Trustees, including the Chairman,” referring to longtime Kennedy Center chair and major donor David Rubenstein. Kennedy Center president Deborah Rutter was also ousted.

In the first month of his second term, Trump has ousted the arts institution’s leadership, filled the board of trustees with his supporters and was elected the board's chair.

Richard Grenell, the center’s new president, told a conservative gathering that the “big change” at the center would be a “huge celebration of the birth of Christ at Christmas.”

The opening scene in the story of President Trump’s takeover of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is a flashback to August 2017, months into his first term as president.Soon after the national cultural center named five luminaries as recipients of its annual Kennedy Center Honors,

American folk musician Rhiannon Giddens has confirmed that she’s cancelled an upcoming show at the Kennedy Center in Washington in protest at its “change in programming direction”. Her statement comes after US President Donald Trump dismissed a number of board members and replaced them with those who are sympathetic to his views on what should and shouldn’t be performed at the prestigious venue.