President Donald Trump's threats to tear down the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts got a scathing rebuke on CNN Thursday from Dave Aronberg, former State Attorney of Palm Beach, Florida.
The whole scheme doesn't make sense, he said — and Trump doesn't have any authority to do it.
"It's about separation of powers," Aronberg told CNN's Brianna Keilar. "I mean, do we have three co-equal branches of government? Does Congress still exist, or can the executive branch just do things that they're not supposed to do because might makes right?"
The board that governs the Kennedy Center, Aronberg continued, is "a statutory trustee of public property. It does not own the land or the building. It has zero statutory authority to demolish or decommission a congressionally created national monument." The only body with the power to do that, he said, is Congress.
"Destroying the Kennedy Center would be like destroying the Lincoln Memorial," said Aronberg. "You just can't do it just because the president gives it the okay."
Trump's threats came after federal courts shut down his allies' move to put his name on the building and close it down for two years of renovations. The Kennedy Center board, stacked with Trump's appointees, is now trying to come up with a loophole by putting Trump's name on the plaza it sits in.
Meanwhile, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has justified a renovation plan by claiming the building is "dangerous" and could crush people with falling slabs of concrete.
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