Kennedy Center Board Approves Plan to Immediately Close Venue

A plan to immediately close the Kennedy Center has been approved. The Donald Trump-backed board of the performing arts venue voted Tuesday to shutter the center, citing necessary renovations and teetering financial prospects, according to NBC News. Trump, the board’s chair, virtually joined the closed-door meeting in which the vote took place, and spent much of his time criticizing trustee Rep. Joyce Beatty, who has challenged the board’s choices in court, and the judge who has blocked his name from being added to the façade again in a Tuesday ruling. The planned closure is the latest developments in more than a year of turmoil and financial distress that came in the wake of the president’s coup of the institution and an ill-fated attempt to add his name to the title of the 55-year-old living monument to the slain national executive. However, the power of the plan to actually close down the center may be challenged. The board’s choice to close the center’s main building was backed by dire messages about the building’s safety and condition in the packet that was distributed to trustees, with it noting that a chunk of the ceiling had fallen after a storm and corrosion was widespread,...