A tour of the Kennedy Center found the president calling out conditions as “emblematic of our country” despite a whopping nine-figure renovation prompting a new promise to the public.
“…we’ll do what has to be done.”
Having named himself chair of the board for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts that he had filled in recent weeks, President Donald Trump was far from pleased when he arrived for the first meeting Monday.
Surveying the facility with interim Executive Director Ric Grenell shone a spotlight on the “tremendous disrepair” that, after a $250 million investment, reflected the waste of the federal government and its misplaced priorities.
Speaking with reporters, the president expressed, “It’s in tremendous disrepair, as is a lot of the rest of our country, most of it because of bad management. This is a shame what I’ve watched and witnessed. They spent a fortune — $250 million — and they built these rooms that nobody is gonna use; rooms underground.”
.@POTUS at the Kennedy Center: “We’re here to have our first board meeting… it’s in tremendous disrepair, as is a lot of the rest of our country because of bad management… they spent a fortune — $250 million — and they built these rooms that nobody’s going to use… We’re… pic.twitter.com/q7jFeIb4gJ
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) March 17, 2025
“We’re gonna fix it up, but it’s really emblematic of our country,” continued Trump who gave an example of the bureaucracy and union structure that would have meant spending $30,000 “to move a piano” in order to have Lee Greenwood perform for the board Monday, in addition to decrying graffiti and cut corners.
“It is so much like what I’m witnessing in other places. We have open borders. We have men playing in women’s sports. It’s all the same thing. It’s all the same mentality and thinking. So, I’m very disappointed when I look around,” he added. “The bottom line: It has tremendous potential. And we’ll work with Congress…it’s a very public facility, and we’ll do what has to be done.”
.@POTUS gestures as he stands in the Presidential Box at the Kennedy Center. pic.twitter.com/IKS4wn1Uq0
— Doug Mills (@dougmillsnyt) March 17, 2025
Indicative of the partisan mentality that has consumed the center, when the Kennedy Center Board of Trustees confirmed Trump as chair, existing members virtue signaled their departures including artistic adviser Renee Fleming, artistic director for the National Symphony Orchestra Ben Folds, and television writer and producer Shonda Rhimes who had been board treasurer.
Their exits also followed a statement from the president who asserted, “I have decided to immediately terminate multiple individuals from the Board of Trustees, including the Chairman, who do not share our Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture…Just last year, the Kennedy Center featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth — THIS WILL STOP. The Kennedy Center is an American Jewel, and must reflect the brightest STARS on its stage from all across our Nation. For the Kennedy Center, THE BEST IS YET TO COME!”
Additional symbolic tantrums opposing the president’s efforts found the producers of the musical “Hamilton” canceling upcoming shows at the Kennedy Center claiming, “We are not acting against his administration, but against the partisan policies of the Kennedy Center as a result of his recent takeover.”
Likewise, attendance of the National Symphony Orchestra by Vice President J.D. Vance and Second Lady Usha Vance who herself has been named to the board, was met with jeering by a crowd that Grenell slammed, “The intolerant Left are radicals who can’t even sit in the same room with people that don’t vote like they do.”
Native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and truth seeker, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and their dog and, when he isn't researching current events and their impacts, you'll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel.
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