Ask PolitiFact: Can President Trump legally demolish the Kennedy Center?

For months, President Donald Trump has been trying to put his personal stamp on the Kennedy Center, the high-profile performance venue in Washington, D.C. Faced with opposition in the courts, Trump has indicated he may want to tear down the center instead — a scenario that one shocked PolitiFact reader asked us about.

“President Trump wants to demolish the Kennedy Center because he’s not allowed to put his name on the building,” the reader wrote. “Can he legally do it? And if he can, does that mean he could also demolish, say, the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument?”

Underlying the reader’s question is Trump’s haste to create or renovate numerous Washington, D.C., sites, including the demolition of the White House’s East Wing for a ballroom, the installation of a 250-foot-tall arch near national monuments and Arlington National Cemetery, and creation of a golf course on public land.

Experts told PolitiFact that Trump would face legal obstacles to demolishing the Kennedy Center. Whether those obstacles would be enough to stop a determined effort to flout the law remains to be seen. Trump has already moved aggressively to tear down the East Wing so he could build a ballroom, despite continuing legal efforts to slow or stop the project.

Why is this under discussion?

Situated on the Potomac River, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts opened in 1971 and serves as a memorial to slain President John F. Kennedy.

During Trump’s second term, he broke tradition by filling the Kennedy Center’s board with loyalists, then announcing the center’s closure to undertake a major renovation. Under the new board, the center also added his name to the marble facade above Kennedy’s and changed its branding to “the Trump-Kennedy Center.”

Critics sued to stop such changes, and in mid-September, that battle came to a head after a series of court rulings unfavorable to Trump, including a judge’s rejection of Trump’s wish to keep his name on the facade in the absence of congressional approval. 

After the board announced it was closing the center, Trump spoke to reporters Sept. 16, reiterating his belief that only he can fix the Kennedy Center’s financial and structural problems — and that to do it, his name needs to be emblazoned on it. 

“For the Trump administration, for me, to get involved and to take that on long term and to carry it or to raise money to carry it, I think that the Trump administration should certainly have recognition,” he said. “Because frankly, if we don’t do that, it’s going to close. It’ll end up being ripped down.”

The possibility of a Kennedy Center teardown gained added attention after Trump was photographed sitting inside Air Force One looking at a poster with the words, “Kennedy Center Demolis” visible, leaving people to guess the rest of the word. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick also shared footage of portions of the center’s ceiling falling down.

Led by Rep. Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, plaintiffs who are seeking to stop Trump’s Kennedy Center takeover quickly cited the photograph of Trump in their legal filings, and on Sept. 17, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper issued an order saying that the administration needed to give 30 days notice before any action — “including but not limited to any ‘demolition’ of the center’s main building” — is taken.

What could stop Trump from tearing down the Kennedy Center?

No judge has yet ruled on the substance of whether Trump can demolish the Kennedy Center unilaterally, said James K. Reap, an emeritus professor at the University of Georgia’s College of Environment & Design. However, Reap said any legal demolition would likely require several specific steps to be completed before a potential Kennedy Center teardown is allowed under the law.

One is a historic preservation review under the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966. This requires a public comment period and a review by the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, a federal agency. 

It would also require an environmental review, as well as adherence to federal property disposal procedures, because the building is over 50 years old and architecturally significant, Reap said. 

The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation voted in July 2026 to advance a rewrite of the regulations that would remove obstacles to the administration’s ability to make structural changes. This is still moving through federal rulemaking and is likely to face legal challenges.

Would Trump be able to tear down the Lincoln Memorial or Washington Monument?

Although Trump has not publicly signaled any thought of tearing down the Lincoln Memorial or Washington Monument, his actions on the East Wing and his comments about the Kennedy Center raise questions about safeguards for other prominent landmarks.

Reap said that right now protections for the Lincoln Memorial or the Washington Monument “sit under a much stronger legal shield.”

First, those monuments are directly administered by the National Park Service, rather than by a politically appointed board, he said. “There’s no comparable governance seam there for a president to exploit the way the Kennedy Center’s hybrid public-private board structure has been exploited,” Reap said.

Both landmarks are also listed in the National Register of Historic Places, which offers at least limited legal protection against the federal government changing or demolishing a property. 

Finally, any new alteration of the National Mall area — where both monuments are located — requires congressional authorization under the Commemorative Works Act of 1986. 

Trump could remove National Park Service or Interior leaders, Reap said, but any effort to pressure the new, pliant Park Service officials into demolishing the Lincoln Memorial or the Washington Monument would still require going through the act’s legally required steps.