Trump Chickens Out at Last Minute in Kennedy Center Demo & Renaming Suit

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1:00Michael Popok:It's the Trump always chickens out Kennedy Center edition. As on Taco Friday, Donald Trump's Department of Justice has now just informed Judge Cooper that they're not going to try to put Donald Trump's name on the Kennedy Center and undermine the memory and the legacy of John F. Kennedy. They're not going to do any of that nor demolish the building at least until October 8th to give the judge time to rule on a motion for emergency injunctive relief to stop the renaming of the building, the renaming of the plaza and the demolition of the building. Taco Friday, everybody. I'm Michael Popak. You're here on Legal AF on Friday.

1:51Michael Popok:Take a moment and hit that free subscribe button. We did reporting yesterday about the hearing in front of Judge Cooper. Now, two months ago, he issued a 96-page decision in which he entered a permanent injunction to stop the renaming of the Kennedy Center for anybody else other than John F. Kennedy. And no, Donald Trump can't slap his name on it or over it. Now they're trying to commemorate, trying to argue, well, no, we're commemorating now his work in raising money and in the restoration of the Kennedy Center. He should have his name on it because he's got courage and power and energy, all these crazy comments that were being made.

2:35Michael Popok:If you want to get a sense of what the lawyers were saying inside the courtroom, here's Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who's taken over the entire event. He thinks he's the bride at the wedding and the body at the funeral when it relates to the Kennedy Center. Here's him outside the courtroom before the hearing. Of course, not testifying inside the courtroom. Isn't that like a stubborn little habit of theirs? They'll say anything when they're not under oath and had cameras around, but they won't submit any evidence to the judge. Play the clip. Cultural institution in America and help Donald J.

3:09Trump make this the greatest building in the world because only he has the power and the expertise to renovate this building in a spectacular fashion during the next two year period and then have a grand, grand opening and really make this building rock. All right. So that's the objective. We all agree it needs to be done. Right. I don't understand why we're here. So I figured I'd come and explain my baffled thing of really, this is what we're using the courtroom for, to say it. But that's where we are. And I'm happy to answer questions.

3:41Michael Popok:Judges are about evidence. Judges are about getting to the bottom of facts and inside of a courtroom. That's the biggest difference between whatever you can say and spew on social media and in front of a bank of cameras and what you can actually say in a courtroom. You notice that there's no reporting about Secretary Lutnik saying a darn thing inside the courtroom. You just watch the proceedings happen. That's the problem with the Department of Justice's case. There's no case. There's no evidence. It's all naked argument of counsel without evidence. In fact, the judge is now considering entering an order to allow Representative Joyce Beattie, who is a board member, to conduct discovery, invasive discovery, to find out this fundamental issue.

4:30Michael Popok:Is the Kennedy Center's board purposefully starving it to death, cutting off funds to make it a fait accompli, that it will fall down, it will become something that needs to be fixed through hundreds of millions of dollars of repairs? Are they purposely avoiding doing the things they need to do to keep the Kennedy Center up and running, including going to Congress for money, by the way? And are they doing it on purpose to starve the Kennedy Center? So after this hearing about, we're going to do some discovery. We're going to find out what's in those text messages, those emails. We're going to find out about funding.

5:14Michael Popok:And the Department of Justice blinked, you know, in this game of chicken with the judge. And let me just read to you. It's not going to take me long. It's literally one sentence. Given the court's wish for additional time to consider the plaintiff's request, which is this motion for emergency injunctive relief, defendants notify the court that the August This 13th resolution by the Board of Trustees, this is the renaming and closing the building and all of that, will not be effectuated before October 8th, 2026. See, I don't think this is good enough. I think this has to go further to make sure the building doesn't get knocked over.

5:56Michael Popok:See, when they threatened to knock over the building and replace it with a cheap amphitheater to, again, sully the memory of John F. Kennedy, if Donald Trump's name didn't get on it, a petulant display, that even the people in the Trump administration thought that had gone too far. Here's a clip of Howard Lutnick saying, no, no, no, we're, you know, buildings fall down and they're old, they're not maintained, but it's not going to fall down on Thursday. Play the clip. The concept of if the building is not properly renovated and restored, eventually it falls into a set of disrepair that it cannot be used.

6:37And since Congress isn't good at doing it, right, if this, let's say he started doing it and just ran out of money, the president said, you know what, I'm not working with it. It's just, I should just step away. You know what? I should just step away. Then what will happen is it'll just run out of money. It'll be a halfway done, a quarter way done, and a run out of money. And then over time, it will just go down and down and down until at some point, a building that was built in 1964 that isn't renovated does eventually get torn down. It does. So he's basically saying, if it's going to be unsafe, what are we going to do about it?

7:14We put$257 million in the bill. So we're in good shape if they just agree to close it and let it renovate it. We're in good shape if they don't agree to let it close and renovate it because the court steps in. What do you want the guy to do? He's only a president for two and a half years. He's going to step away as correctly you would think you would. He's not going to do it. A third of the renovation. And eventually this building is going to fall into horrible disrepair and be very dangerous. and that's what's going to happen. Ultimately, it needs to be renovated and we all know.

7:48Michael Popok:If I am the lawyers for Joyce Beattie, and I know that they're on their game, they're going to file and say this is insufficient, that the judge should enter a temporary administrative stay at least to stop the demolition of the building, to make sure that the funding of the building continues and that the building isn't harmed, that the public trust is preserved while he has time to issue his next injunction. And that would be in the form of a preliminary stay. I don't think there's any two ways about it. That's one thing that I, slight criticism of the lawyers for Representative Beattie, I would be filing papers to replace the board.

8:30Michael Popok:I would be seeking to have that board removed, it be placed in a monitorship under the supervision of the judge while he gets to the bottom of whether the trust, the public trust is being violated. You know, I don't think we can presume good faith anymore by that board. And I think they should start a process to establish, using the court's equitable and inherent authority, this monitorship, you know, with an officer of the court running the show and putting the trustees out in the cold for now. That's what I would do. At least I would start that process. That hasn't been the approach so far of the lawyers, but at the very least, they have to agree with me that this notice is insufficient to give them any level of comfort about the Kennedy Center.

9:23I mean,

9:23Michael Popok:I think they have to say, all right, well, that was their attempt, judge, but you need to enter an administrative stay. I would hope that I'll be reporting on that in the next several hours in this particular case. But as of right now, if they don't go forward with the naming or the demolition until October 8th, although there's no penalty if they violate this, it's a notice. It's not an order of the court. See, what's going to have to follow next is some sort of order of the court memorializing this. Otherwise, there's no teeth here. It's as good as the paper it's written on. And we know this is an administration that will, whenever it wants to, knock over buildings like the East Wing of the White House and then try to get permission for it after the fact without getting approval.

10:15Michael Popok:So you can't trust them. I don't want to have an oops moment. Oops, half the Kennedy Center disappeared under the tarp that's out there. I think that Judge Cooper has got to take a stronger hand here. And the lawyers for Representative Beattie have to lead him there. We'll follow it here on Legal AF. Take a minute, hit the free subscribe button. Until my next report, I'm Michael Popak. Popak here. When life changes in an instant because of an injury or the bad acts of another, you need fighters in your corner. The Popak firm is dedicated to helping the injured and their families get justice and the money they deserve and we don't back down contact us today and let's start your fight for justice together