Protesters, including Nadine Siler of Waldorf, Maryland, dressed in a pink frog costume, hold signs at a designated protest point in front of the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, a day after a Trump-appointed board voted to add President Donald Trump’s name to the Kennedy Center, Saturday, Dec. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP/AP
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Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP/AP
The Kennedy Center is closing out the year with a new round of artists saying they will cancel scheduled performances after President Donald Trump’s name was added to the facility, prompting the institution’s president to accuse artists of making their decisions for political reasons.
The Cookers, a jazz supergroup that has performed together for nearly two decades, announced their withdrawal from “A Jazz New Year’s Eve” on their website, saying “the decision was made very quickly” and acknowledging the frustration of those who had planned to attend.
Doug Varone and Dancers, a New York-based dance group, said in an Instagram post Monday night that they were pulling out of a performance scheduled for April, saying “we can no longer afford or ask our audiences to come into this once great institution.”
Those moves come after musician Chuck Redd canceled a Christmas Eve performance last week. They also come amid a decline in ticket sales for the venue, as well as news that viewership for the Dec. 23 Kennedy Center Honors telecast, which Trump had predicted would skyrocket, was down about 35% compared to the 2024 show.
The announcements represent a volatile schedule for one of America’s most prominent performing arts venues and cap a tense year in which Trump ousted the Kennedy Center’s board of directors and named himself president of the institution. That led to an earlier round of rejection from artists, with performer Issa Rae and “Hamilton” producers canceling scheduled engagements while musicians Ben Folds and Renee Fleming stepped down from their advisory roles.
The Cookers didn’t mention the building’s name change or the Trump administration, but they did say that when they perform again, they wanted to make sure “the venue can celebrate the full presence of the music and everyone in it,” reiterating a commitment “to playing music that cuts across divisions rather than deepening them.”
The group may not have directly addressed the Kennedy Center situation, but one of its members has. On Saturday, saxophonist Billy Harper said in comments posted on Jazz Stage’s Facebook page that he “would never consider performing at a venue that bears a name (and is controlled by the kind of board) that represents overt racism and deliberate destruction of African-American music and culture. The same music I dedicated my life to creating and promoting.”
According to the White House, Trump’s hand-picked board of directors approved the name change. Harper said that both the board “and the name displayed on the building itself represent a mentality and practices that I have always opposed. And I still do, today more than ever.”
Richard Grenell, a Trump ally whom the president tapped to head the Kennedy Center after he ousted previous leadership, posted Monday night on
In a statement Tuesday to The Associated Press, Grenell said that “the last-minute cancellations prove that they were never willing to perform for everyone, even those with whom they disagree politically,” adding that the Kennedy Center had been “inundated with inquiries from real artists willing to perform for everyone and who reject political statements in their art.”
There was no immediate word from Kennedy Center officials on whether the entity would take legal action against the latest round of artists who canceled performances. Following Redd’s cancellation last week, Grenell said he would seek $1 million in damages for what he called a “political stunt.”
Not all artists are canceling their shows. Bluegrass banjoist Randy Barrett, who will perform at the Kennedy Center next month, told the AP that he was “deeply concerned about the politics” of the venue and respected those who had canceled, but feels that “our tribalized country needs more music and art, not less. It’s one of the few things that can unite us.”
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, and Congress passed a law the following year naming the center as a living memorial to him. Scholars have said any change to the building’s name would need congressional approval; The law explicitly prohibits the board of directors from turning the center into a monument to anyone else and from putting anyone else’s name on the outside of the building.
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Associated Press writers Steven Sloan and Hillel Italie contributed to this report.