Fencing is erected outside the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, a day after the Kennedy Center Board voted to close the center for repairs, in Washington, D.C., U.S., September 16, 2026. REUTERS/Jessica Koscielniak
A federal judge ordered President Donald Trump and the Kennedy Center's board to respond by Thursday morning to an emergency motion filed as forklifts were seen striking the building while quickly moved to encircle it with fencing.
Judge Christopher Cooper signed the order Wednesday, less than two hours after Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH) filed the motion, the court docket shows. Trump and the other defendants must answer by 10 a.m. Thursday, and the court will schedule a prompt hearing if necessary after reviewing that response.
Beatty, who sits on the Center's board, asked for the hearing over what she called the unlawful closure of the building, and asked that a senior decision-maker be ordered to attend, her motion says.
Cooper's May order blocks the board from closing the Center until it approves a shutdown that follows his opinion and he lifts that freeze, the motion says. The board voted Tuesday to close. Cooper has not lifted it.
"It seems Defendants may be violating the 'clear and unambiguous order of the Court,'" Beatty's lawyers wrote, quoting a 2025 appeals court ruling.
Trump announced the immediate closure Tuesday on Truth Social, writing that the board had agreed almost unanimously to shut the building for safety reasons and begin reconstruction.
"The closing will take place immediately, however, the Renovation and Reconstruction … cannot begin until such time as the D.C. Circuit rules on the Board's approved name," Trump wrote.
A staff member at the law firm representing Beatty went to the Center on Wednesday morning, according to a sworn declaration filed with the motion.
Bridget Kennedy-Bailey said she arrived just after 10 a.m., minutes past the posted opening time, and found the front door locked.
"No, we're closed," a security guard told her after opening the door with a badge, Kennedy-Bailey said. The guard said the building would stay shut all day.
Shateik Jones, a security operations specialist, came outside minutes later and said the order came from "higher-ups," she said. Jones told her he was instructed to keep the doors locked and did not know why.
Kennedy-Bailey left before 11 a.m. and returned shortly before noon, when a guard stopped her car from using the drop-off area she had used earlier, she said.
"When I got out of the car, I saw that black metal gates had been placed in front of the building since I left," she wrote. "I walked around to both the north and south sides of the building and saw that the gates wrapped all around there, too, and blocked all the staircases leading to the building."
Four more gates blocked the main walkway, traffic cones filled the car drop-off, and a gap under scaffolding was later closed off, she wrote.
"While I was standing outside the gates, I saw forklifts bringing more gates to the front of the building," she wrote, describing white and orange barriers of the type used on construction sites.
Patricia Haynes, who said she works in security for the Center, told her the gates were up for "public safety" because of construction inside. A man who identified himself as PJ and said he handles public relations said the building "is closed for these repairs" and that staff "are not allowed in without a hard hat," according to the declaration.
The Kennedy Center's spokesperson, Roma Daravi, confirmed the closure late Wednesday morning in a post on X.
"Compounding systemic infrastructure failures from decades of neglect have left a crumbling building and safety concerns require an immediate closure of [the Kennedy Center] main building," Daravi wrote.
Brantley Myers, a lawyer for the defendants, had told Beatty's team the night before that a loudspeaker closure announcement followed an improperly triggered fire alarm, the motion says. Asked Wednesday for an explanation, he wrote that the defense "will respond with an explanation as soon as we can," and had not written again when the motion was filed.
"Afterward, I saw a forklift carrying what appeared to be a more permanent form of fencing drive over to the north side of the building. I saw the forklift run into and hit the pillars on the building several times," Kennedy-Bailey wrote.