President Trump said the Kennedy Center makeover that he announced Sunday will cost $200 million and use “the highest-grade marbles, the highest-grade everything.”
Construction on the performing arts center is slated to begin July 4 and last two years. Trump indicated Monday the changes will be extensive while denying he would entirely tear down the living memorial to President Kennedy.
“I’ll be using the steel,” he said. “So we’re using the structure.”
Trump also said in July, after tearing down the East Wing of the White House, that he planned to build a ballroom in its place that will cost $200 million. That project is now believed to come with a $400 million price tag.
“This important decision, based on input from many Highly Respected Experts, will take a tired, broken, and dilapidated Center, one that has been in bad condition, both financially and structurally for many years, and turn it into a World Class Bastion of Arts, Music, and Entertainment,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post explaining why the Kennedy Center needed to be revamped just days after he hosted a premiere party there for the first lady’s documentary “Melania.”
Trump has gone to great lengths to literally affix his name to the Washington D.C. center named for the nation’s 35th President in 1964 following his assassination.
He started by hand-selecting a board of loyalists to oversee operations after beginning his second term as president early last year. That board announced in December it planned to rename the building the Trump Kennedy Center. Trump’s name was literally added to the building’s wall a short time later.
Several artists cancelled engagements to perform there following the change.
President Trump said he chose to close the Kennedy Center during construction so the process could move forward more efficiently.
With News Wire Services
