Kennedy Center finances deteriorated sharply after Trump name change

Ticket sales and fundraising collapsed after President Donald Trump's name was added to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, even as the center's leaders publicly touted a financial turnaround, according to confidential documents obtained by The Washington Post.

Ticket sales had already dropped in the 10 months following Trump's takeover, but both ticket sales and donations plunged after the Trump-led board of trustees voted in December to rename the center after him and put his name on the front of the building, according to the records.

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The documents show that leaders knew both were cratering even as they publicly portrayed Trump's takeover as a financial rescue. In a failed June request to keep Trump's name on the building, for instance, a Justice Department lawyer wrote that renaming the center after Trump "represented a saving of The Kennedy Center which, if this doesn't happen, would go into financial and structural collapse."

Just the week before, the center's own financial projections showed ticket revenue and fundraising had plummeted after the name change, putting it on track to fall nearly $100 million short of its revenue target.

The records - internal budgets, management forecasts, board minutes and financial presentations - provide the first comprehensive accounting of the center's financial deterioration in the year and a half since Trump replaced dozens of board members with allies and installed himself as chairman. Even after slashing expenses, center officials projected earned revenue this fiscal year to miss its budget target by 70 percent and contributed revenue to fall 25 percent short. The revenue miss was projected to leave the center with a $23 million deficit.

"The center took a huge hit when the takeover happened," and then appeared to stabilize, according to an official familiar with the center's financial situation. But after the name change, "it was just an absolute fiscal cliff. Donors disappeared, ticket sales disappeared, artists disappeared - like it was doomsday."

Andrew Taylor, director of American University's arts management program, who reviewed the documents at The Post's request, described the declines as "a nosedive."

Trump's takeover "had a consequence," Taylor said, "and the consequence was a catastrophic drop in revenue."

In response to detailed questions from The Post, a Kennedy Center spokesperson blamed the center's financial problems on its previous leadership, saying it inherited years of financial mismanagement. Putting Trump's name on the building attracted new donors and helped raise money for renovations, the spokesperson said, adding that a proposed fiscal 2027 budget is balanced. The center did not dispute The Post's account of its internal fiscal 2026 projections.