The board of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on Wednesday voted to elect President Trump as its new chair, days after Trump declared himself the chair of the Washington, DC, institution. Trump followed that declaration up by removing all the Biden-appointed members of the board, the Washington Post reports. It was the new board, made up entirely of Trump appointees, that elected him. New members of the board include White House personnel office director Sergio Gor, chief of staff Susie Wiles, and second lady Usha Vance. The former chief official White House photographer, who worked in the Reagan and Obama administrations, was among those in the arts community raising concerns about the move, the Guardian reports.
"Apparently, the impending dictatorship has reached the arts," he wrote in a lengthy Instagram post giving examples of dictatorships in which artists were oppressed. "What will happen now that the Kennedy Center has been overtaken in a brazenly political coup d'état. Will FOTUS [referring to Trump] now personally choose who receives the Kennedy Center honors?" A president has never before removed his predecessor's appointees to the Kennedy Center board, nor named himself chair. Big names were leaving their posts at the center: Musician Ben Folds and opera singer Renée Fleming said they'd no longer serve as artistic advisers, and TV producer Shonda Rhimes stepped down as treasurer of the board of trustees. (More Kennedy Center stories.)
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