The general counsel’s office at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts told employees in a memo on Thursday to “immediately” remove President Trump’s name from the institution’s branding on official forms and other documents. The mandate came days after a federal judge ruled that the board’s decision to add the president’s name to the building had been unlawful.
The memo gave staff members detailed instructions on the materials that needed to be updated, including social media accounts, email signatures and voice mail messages. It specified that outdoor and indoor signage with the barred name must be altered by June 12.
Shortly after the judge issued his decision on Friday, Kennedy Center leaders indicated that they planned to appeal. Mr. Trump was so incensed by the ruling — which also temporarily blocked his plan to close the building for renovations — that he threatened to walk away entirely from oversight of the center, where he serves as the chairman.
The internal memo took a far less defiant tone, and did not address whether the center’s Trump-allied leaders still intend to fight the decision in court.
“We are complying with the court’s order while evaluating all legal options to preserve this revitalization and recognize President Trump’s leadership,” Roma Daravi, a spokeswoman for the Kennedy Center, said in a statement.
The center’s board, stacked with the president’s supporters, voted in December to add his name to the institution. Less than a day later, the letters on the center’s marble facade read: “The Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.”
The website logo was changed, employees revised their email signatures and the new name showed up in the broadcast of the Kennedy Center Honors. For a short time, black tape was affixed to some signs around the building, covering up what leadership deemed a defunct title.
As Mr. Trump’s name showed up in more and more places around the building, a lawsuit challenging the title change proceeded through federal court. Representative Joyce Beatty, a Democrat of Ohio and an ex officio member of the Kennedy Center’s board, argued in her suit that the board could not unilaterally change the title of an institution that was named by Congress.
Judge Christopher R. Cooper of Federal District Court in Washington agreed last week, ruling that the Kennedy Center must remove Mr. Trump’s name from the building and official materials within two weeks.
The memo sent to employees on Thursday reflects that instruction, requiring them to alter the name on the institution’s website, ID cards and parking signage by that deadline.
Ms. Beatty’s lawsuit also objected to Mr. Trump’s plan to close the center for two years of renovations. It expressed skepticism about the true reason for the closure, pointing to declining ticket revenues and an exodus of artists following the president’s takeover.
Kennedy Center officials have argued that there was an urgent need for major renovations, and that temporarily closing the building was the most sensible path. Judge Cooper acknowledged that repair work was “sorely needed” but said the board did not properly consider the potential consequences of such a closure on a performing arts institution. He called the decision “seemingly preordained” in response to Mr. Trump’s announcement on Feb. 1 that the Kennedy Center would close.
The judge did not permanently block the board from closing the institution, but rather ordered that if the members decide to do so, it must be after “independently balancing its multiple obligations to the Center in a prudent fashion.”
In a post on social media after the ruling, Mr. Trump railed against Judge Cooper and suggested he might disown an institution that, in his second term, has been a central part of his efforts to transform Washington’s cultural landscape.
“Unless I am free to do what I do better than anyone else, bring this Institution back, physically, financially, and artistically,” he said in the post last week, “I have no interest in continuing what could only be a hopeless journey into ‘NEVER NEVER LAND.’”
The memo to Kennedy Center employees on Thursday indicated that leadership had not yet decided on a path forward, which could involve trying to close next month as planned or move toward a more phased approach.
“The center is considering its options and will provide further guidance shortly,” the memo said.
