Senator alleges Kennedy Center renovations were rushed to accommodate Trump preferences

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island released a whistleblower complaint accusing the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts of sidestepping federal contracting procedures and undertaking unnecessary renovations to satisfy President Donald Trump’s design preferences. The complaint, addressed to the center’s leadership, cites several examples of work that Whitehouse says was rushed and poorly executed.

According to the filing, the center’s Trump-appointed officials ordered the gold-coloured exterior columns to be repainted white, a change that led to rust penetrating the new paint after the contractor, hired without a written contract, began work in August. Whitehouse estimates the repair costs at $1.5 million, noting that a $4.4 million contract was only formalized after the work started.

The complaint also mentions the removal of newly installed bathroom tiles because the president allegedly disliked the colour, and a “cosmetic revamp” of the center’s reflecting pool that left it unevenly painted and rusting. Whitehouse says a contractor with no concert-hall experience received an $8 million contract for the project.

“These are not isolated lapses but a single pattern that runs counter to everything the Center has told Congress it would do with the public’s money,” Whitehouse wrote.

“Instead of pursuing renovations tailored to the building’s actual needs, the Center rushed a series of renovations driven by the President’s aesthetic whims and his desire to star in a series of televised events in December.”

Whitehouse, a member of the Senate Committee on the Environment and Public Works, called for a full accounting of the renovation costs and the expense of affixing Trump’s name to the building. He added that public funds should be used lawfully and prudently, not to accommodate a president’s stylistic preferences.

A federal judge previously ordered that Trump’s name be removed from the Kennedy Center, reaffirming that only Congress can change the institution’s name. The dispute over the center’s renovations is part of broader concerns about the administration’s influence over cultural and historic sites in Washington, D.C.