Kennedy Center President Rick Grenell said the organization will seek $1 million in damages from jazz musician Chuck Redd after Redd abruptly canceled this year’s free Christmas Eve concert in protest of the center’s renaming to add Trump’s name to the building that is a memorial to President John F. Kennedy.
Grenell stated in a letter dated December 26, “Your decision to withdraw at the last moment — explicitly in response to the Center’s recent renaming, which honors President Trump’s extraordinary efforts to save this national treasure — is classic intolerance and very costly to a non-profit Arts institution.”
*** The concert was free.
“This is your official notice that we will seek $1 million in damages from you for this political stunt,” Grenell wrote.
Redd, a drummer and vibraphone player, had led the annual Christmas Eve jazz concert at the Kennedy Center since 2006. On Wednesday, he told the AP that he nixed this year’s event after Trump’s name was added to the organization’s building and website. “When I saw the name change on the Kennedy Center website and then hours later on the building, I chose to cancel our concert,” Redd said, per the AP.
Legal experts say the renaming of the center is illegal, because a 1964 federal law established its name as “The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts” after the slain president and explicitly prohibits the board of trustees from adding any other name to the building’s exterior. On Dec. 22, U.S. Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) sued Trump and the Kennedy Center’s board seeking to force the removal of Trump’s name from the organization, saying an act of Congress is required to change its name.