A Christmas Eve jazz concert at the Trump-Kennedy Center was canceled Wednesday after the host of the annual holiday show pulled out in protest of the iconic venue’s name change.
The performing arts center’s board of directors, chaired by President Trump, voted unanimously last week to rename the institution after the commander-in-chief, dubbing it the Trump Kennedy Center.
“When I saw the name change on the Kennedy Center website and then hours later on the building, I chose to cancel our concert,” Chuck Redd, the drummer, vibraphone player and longtime host of the Christmas Eve concert, said in a statement to the Associated Press.
“I’ve been performing at the Kennedy Center since the beginning of my career and I was saddened to see this name change,” Redd told CNN.
The free concert, which was also slated to be livestreamed, was marked “canceled” on the Trump-Kennedy Center website.
The Trump-Kennedy Center and Redd did not immediately respond to The Post’s requests for comment.
Last week, Trump told reporters he was “surprised” the board moved to name the center after him and “honored by it.”
The president, however, had previously hinted that a name change was coming and even inadvertently referred to the venue as the “Trump-Kennedy Center” earlier this month.
Democratic congressional leaders and other critics of the rebrand contend that the board does not have the authority to rename the performing arts center, which was previously named in honor of former President John F. Kennedy.
Shortly after being sworn into his second term, Trump purged the center’s board of all of former President Joe Biden’s picks and appointed himself chairman and staunch ally Ric Grenell as interim executive director.
“Hamilton” creator Lin-Manuel Miranda and other artists have announced they will not run musical productions, concerts or hold events at the venue in response to the board’s overall.
The president has pledged to usher in a “Golden Age in Arts and Culture” at the Trump-Kennedy Center.
