'Gross': Critics Recoil After Trump-Appointed Board Adds His Name to Kennedy Center

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Thursday drew an outraged reaction after she announced that members of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts board, who were appointed by President Donald Trump, had voted to add his name to the building.

In a post on X, Leavitt announced that the building would henceforth be known as the "Trump-Kennedy Center," despite the fact that the building was originally named by the US Congress in the wake of President John F. Kennedy's assassination in 1963.

"I have just been informed that the highly respected Board of the Kennedy Center... have just voted unanimously to rename the Kennedy Center to the Trump-Kennedy Center," Leavitt wrote on X, "because of the unbelievable work President Trump has done over the last year in saving the building. Not only from the standpoint of its reconstruction, but also financially, and its reputation."

Despite Leavitt's claim, it does not appear that the vote in favor of renaming the building was unanimous. Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio), an ex-officio Kennedy Center board member, said after the vote that she had been muted during a call where other board members had voted to add Trump's name to the building, and was thus "not allowed to speak or voice my opposition to this move."

Journalist Terry Moran noted that the Kennedy Center board does not have the power to rename the building without prior approval of US Congress.

"Congress establishes these institutions through law, and only a new law can rename them," Moran wrote, and then commented, "also—gross."

Members of the Kennedy family also expressed anger at the move to rename the center.

Former US Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-Mass.) wrote on Bluesky that "the Kennedy Center is a living memorial to a fallen president and named for President Kennedy by federal law," and "can no sooner be renamed than can someone rename the Lincoln Memorial, no matter what anyone says."

Journalist Maria Shriver, a niece of the late president, could barely express her anger at the decision.

"Some things leave you speechless, and enraged, and in a state of disbelief," she wrote. "At times such as that, it’s better to be quiet. For how long, I can’t say."

Shortly afterward, Shriver wrote another post in which she attacked Trump for being "downright weird" with his obsession with having things named after himself.

"It is beyond comprehension that this sitting president has sought to rename this great memorial dedicated to President Kennedy," she said. "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, rename the Lincoln Memorial, the Trump Lincoln Memorial. The Trump Jefferson Memorial. The Trump Smithsonian. The list goes on."