Jimmy Kimmel has suggested a new name for the Kennedy Center as it remains the object of Donald Trump’s obsession.
The 80-year-old president has insisted on a Trump-themed overhaul of the historic center since returning to office in 2025.
From the onset of his second inauguration, Trump began exerting control over the arts center, naming himself chairman and adding his name to the building.
More than a year later, a U.S. District Judge ordered Trump’s name to be removed from the structure, causing the president to have several meltdowns. On Tuesday, the Kennedy Center Board of Trustees voted to shutter the main building’s doors for two years to complete renovations, a decision Trump announced on Truth Social.
Trump’s main gripe is that his name is no longer plastered across a building that hosts some of the nation’s most significant events and honors.
“Yesterday, Trump’s handpicked board at the Kennedy Center voted to close for renovations, moments after a judge ruled they cannot add Trump’s name to the building without approval from Congress,” began Kimmel on Wednesday night.
“So now the big baby says if the Supreme Court doesn’t overturn that ruling and put his name on the wall next to Kennedy’s, there will be no renovations at all,” he continued.
Kimmel then offered a suggestion to the administration. “He’s holding the building hostage,” he said. “They really should call it the Melania Trump Kennedy Center.”
The late-night host and longtime Trump nemesis frequently quips about the first lady–and the apparent lack of warmth between her and her husband. “She must really hate him,” he said in April, after Melania gave an unexpected, suspiciously timed speech about her ties to Jeffrey Epstein. “He spent the past six weeks trying to bomb this Epstein story out of the headlines. Two days after the ceasefire, she puts it right back on top.”
Kimmel turned his attention back to Trump’s insistence on slapping his name on the iconic cultural institution. “He’s putting his name, for whatever reason, on everything in town. And his face, too,” said the ABC host, revealing photographs of the exteriors of the Department of Labor and Department of the Interior.
“At this point, the only thing he doesn’t want his name on is Don Jr.,” concluded Kimmel.
When asked why it is so important to have his name on the Kennedy Center, Trump gave a convoluted response.
“Well, it’s a very easy question to answer because it’s a mess,” he replied to a reporter in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Wednesday. “The Kennedy Center for many years has lost tens of millions of dollars, even hundreds of millions of dollars. It’s a big loser, financially. And many other places like that, like Carnegie Hall and various places throughout the country, they lose a lot of money.”
“They were losing, the Kennedy Center—sometimes hundreds of millions, before I got involved,” he went on. “So for the Trump administration, for me, to... take that long-term and to carry it or to raise money to carry it, I think the Trump administration should certainly have recognition. Because frankly, if we don’t do that it’s going to close. It’ll end up being ripped down. It’s in very, very bad shape. Very dangerous shape.”
