Donald Trump Takes Over the Kennedy Center — Page 2

PipingHotPiccolo said: "disbanding a bipartisan board because you dont like their art and installing yourself as the new chairman is something a silly petty dictator would so, and has now done.

if you didnt enthusiastically vote for kamala (and thats 70% of the country), you voted for this, and its only going to get worse and worse."

I wonder if Equity (for actors) and other performing unions will respond if and when Trump follows through on determining what gets performed.

Elections have consequences.

As somewhat of an eternal optimist, I believe we'll survive this second Trump administration, but not without a lot of damage to the already-fragile foundations of our democracy. My hope is that those in the opposition party (and really all of us who oppose him) will drill down on slowing down and frustrating his initiatives as much as possible long enough for Democrats to flip Congress in a year and a half.

Who is gonna choreograph the Scott Baio salute when he becomes an honoree?

“The President hasn’t learned the lines you’d like to hear, he won’t join your clubs… he’ll simply take control as you disappear.” These paraphrased lines from Evita are just ringing through my head right now. Scary times, friends. I’m so sorry for all at the Kennedy Center caught up in this madness.

So, the President doesn’t actually have the legal authority to fire all the trustees, en masse. It’s a bipartisan board and every trustee serves for 6 year terms; there’s no “at the pleasure of the President” stipulated. This is just another one of Trumps stunts to distract us from Elon Musks raid on the federal government.

Kad said: "If I were running an arts nonprofit relying on federal grants, I would be preparing for the worst as President Musk and Supreme Leader Trump tighten their grasp."

The silver lining is that the NEA only funds projects that are already happening, won't fund more than 50% of a project, orgs must demonstrate fiscal responsibility, and a lot of the grants are relatively small. The smart companies already operate with the "never expect anything from the NEA" philosophy. A loss of $50K shouldn't kill any company.

1,369 days till election day 2028...........

Call_me_jorge said: "So, the President doesn’t actually have the legal authority to fire all the trustees, en masse. It’s a bipartisan board and every trustee serves for 6 year terms; there’s no “at the pleasure of the President” stipulated. This is just another one of Trumps stunts to distract us from Elon Musks raid on the federal government."

The statute doesn't need to say board members serve at the pleasure of the President; Seila Law recognizes the President's plenary authority to dismiss individuals exercising executive power. (And the KC board isn't legislating or exercising judicial power, so its quasi-governmental functions must be executive in nature.) The only exception is requiring for-cause dismissal for independent commissions per Humphrey's Executor, and that's probably on its way out soon.

I find Trump's intrusion into the artistic independence of the KC repulsive, but this is probably one of the least problematic things he's done, from a legal standpoint. Even Deborah Rutter recognized as much. Per the Washington Post:

“Per the Center’s governance established by Congress in 1958, the chair of the board of trustees is appointed by the Center’s board members,” Rutter wrote. “There is nothing in the Center’s statute that would prevent a new administration from replacing board members; however, this would be the first time such an action has been taken with Kennedy Center’s board.”

https://wapo.st/40NQjJC

not sure we learned the correct lesson

we live in a country where we have a maga cult and we cant wish away its existence

they are intractable

so we need the political center to swing our way in order to win elections and set reasonable policy

and what did we offer them for this election?

defund the police

college campus chaos

latinx

cancel culture

sign these ‘we see you’ petitions ~ or else

learn 200 new pronouns ~ or else

rampant tolerated anti-semitism

zero acknowledgement about inflation and the hardship its been causing working class families



these all drove normally reasonable voters away and into trump world

if only 1.14 million voters had changed their minds and voted harris instead of trump we wouldnt be in this nightmare

or maybe some of the 3.18 million voters who sat out entirely in protest might have made the difference but hey ‘genocide joe’ was apparently the worst possible president when it came to gaza

instead the pendulum was pushed too hard and swung decisively in the other direction

how bad do you have to be as a party for voters to think that trump was going to be the better option

and lets not kid ourselves

pretty much every minority group and every county in every state moved further right this past election

especially in the latino / latina communities

ppl on this board dont like hearing it but

as the saying goes

go woke go broke



MezzoDiva47 has spoken

bow down accordingly