Chuck Schumer

Dec. 19 (UPI) — President Donald Trump‘s name was affixed Friday to The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., with one Kennedy family member threatening to chisel the change out.

Signage now reads: Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.” Workers added Trump’s name before one honoring the former president.

The change has drawn opposition, including members of the Kennedy family.

“Three years and one month from today, I’m going to grab a pickax and pull those letters off that building, but I’m going to need help holding the ladder,” Kerry Kennedy, the daughter of former Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, posted on X. “Are you in? Applying for my carpenter’s card today, so it’ll be a union job!!!”

On Thursday, Trump’s handpicked board of trustees voted to rename the building to also honor Trump. Eleven months ago, after he became president for the second time, he dismissed the entire board with new members and named himself chairman.

The name change requires a vote by U.S. Congress as mentioned in the U.S. Code that says no new “memorials or plaques in the nature of memorials shall be designated or installed in the public areas of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.”

Trump also changed something else that requires congressional approval: the Defense Department to the War Department.

White House press secretary Karline Leavitt posted on X, the it was changed “because of the unbelievable work President Trump has done over the last year in saving the building.

“Not only from the standpoint of its reconstruction, but also financially, and its reputation.”

Trump said he was “surprised and honored” by the news, though he hinted about the change while he emceed the Kennedy Center Honors earlier this month.

In August, he posted on Truth Social about new honorees: “GREAT Nominees for the TRUMP/KENNEDY CENTER, whoops, I mean, KENNEDY CENTER.”

Kerry Kennedy said Trump doesn’t represent the values of her uncle.

“President Kennedy proudly stood for justice, peace, equality, dignity, diversity, and compassion for those who suffer. President Trump stands in opposition to these values, and his name should not be placed alongside President Kennedy’s.”

Maria Shriver, the former President Kennedy’s niece and former first lady of California, wrote on X.: “It is beyond wild that he would think adding his name in front of President Kennedy’s name is acceptable. It is not. Next thing perhaps he will want to rename JFK Airport, rename the Lincoln Memorial, the Trump Lincoln Memorial. The Trump Jefferson Memorial. The Trump Smithsonian. The list goes on.”

Robert F. Kennedy’s grandson, former Rep. Joe Kennedy III of Massachusetts, posted on X that the center is “a living memorial to a fallen president and named for President Kennedy by federal law. It can no sooner be renamed than can someone rename the Lincoln Memorial, no matter what anyone says.”

Six Democratic lawmakers, who serve as ex-officio members of the Kennedy Center board, said in a statement to CNBC: “Beyond using the Kennedy Center to reward his friends and political allies, President Trump is now attempting to affix his name to yet another public institution without legal authority. Federal law established the Center as a memorial to President Kennedy and prohibits changing its name without Congressional action.”

Congress’ two Democratic leaders, Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, signed the statement.

Another ex-officio member of the board, a Republican, didn’t vote for the change. Sen. Shelly Moore Capito, R-W.V., told reporters at the Capitol on Thursday: “The Kennedy Center, in my view, is the Kennedy Center.”

U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson (L), D-Miss, pictured in December 2022 with then-U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., (R) at House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection on the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. On Wednesday, an ex-Senate aide announced his bid to unseat Thompson. File Photo by Ken Cedeno/UPI | License Photo

Dec. 17 (UPI) — Evan Turnage, a Jackson lawyer and ex-senate aide, is challenging Rep. Bennie Thompson in Mississippi’s 2nd District Democratic primary.

Turnage, 33, a Yale Law and Murrah High alumnus, formerly advised U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. He launched his campaign after returning home and hearing voters’ frustration over the district’s stagnant economy under Thompson’s long tenure, he said.

“I’ve talked to so many people and it’s clear that there’s an appetite for new leadership, an appetite for a fighter from Mississippi,” Turnage said in an interview.

Mississippi’s 2nd District covers Jackson and much of the Delta. With a majority-Black and solidly Democratic electorate, real competition happens in the primary and not the general election.

“This is the poorest district in the poorest state in the country. It was like that when he was elected, and it remains that way today,” he added.

Thompson, 77, has held the seat since 1993 as one of Mississippi’s longest-serving officials and has maintained broad support while gaining national recognition for civil rights issues, security and oversight.

Turnage joined Schumer’s team as chief counsel in early 2023, departing two years later to return to Jackson.

He said his time in the nation’s capital influenced his run for office, but a recent local Democratic runoff also shaped his decision.

“Grocery prices are the No. 1 economic concern I hear about,” Turnage said. “That experience in Washington showed me how much Congress can do when it’s willing to stand up to corporations.”

Turnage said his campaign will be focused on government reform, economic growth and protecting voting rights.

Mississippi’s Democratic primary is slated for March 2026.