Kennedy Center Fight: Trump Formally Invokes Executive Privilege — Over Records of His Nonprofit Board Chairmanship

Kennedy Center Fight: Trump Formally Invokes Executive Privilege — Over Records of His Nonprofit Board Chairmanship

UPDATE (Oct. 14–15, 2026): The privilege invocation is now formal — and it covers his management of a congressionally created nonprofit.

In a court filing late Wednesday (Oct. 14), Joshua Hoyt, a deputy assistant and deputy counsel to the president, said that at "the direction of the President," he was "formally invoking the presidential communications privilege with respect to information, documents, and communications requested" by Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) — the ex officio board member litigating against Trump's adding his name to the building and his directive that the center be shuttered for two years while he seeks "recognition" for renovations.

The claimed scope (Hoyt declaration): privilege covers "information, documents, and communications shared between the President, his advisors (government and non-government), and Kennedy Center staff, pertaining to the management and operation" of the center — and extends to communications "to or from his advisors and/or Kennedy Center staff."

Beatty's counter-theory (her Oct. 6 filing): Trump is a defendant as board chair of a congressionally created nonprofit, not as president; the Kennedy Center "is not part of the executive branch 'and does not exercise executive power'"; and he "voluntarily assumed the 'usual powers and obligations of a trustee.'" Her lawyers, Norm Eisen (Democracy Defenders Action) and Nathaniel Zelinsky: "Donald Trump appointed himself as chair of the non-profit board of the Kennedy Center, and is now trying to shield his management by improperly invoking executive privilege¹... This kind of cover-up is a direct assault on the rule of law."

DOJ's answer: Trump's involvement with the center "is undoubtedly in his official capacity" — because "the president is always the president," and the Framers vested "the executive Power" in one person. In a separate Wednesday filing, DOJ called Beatty's document demands an improper "fishing expedition."

Judge Christopher Cooper has not yet weighed in. Earlier this month he allowed Beatty's team to pursue discovery into the photo of Trump aboard Air Force One viewing a poster reading "Kennedy Center DEMOLISH."

Backdrop: the venue closed Sept. 15 on a temporary basis for what center officials described as emergency safety assessments and "has not reopened"; Cooper blocked the board's second naming attempt the same day; Trump says the center stays closed unless his name is restored.

What it means: the naming/closure fight has opened a new separation-of-powers front — whether presidential communications privilege follows the president into a private-nonprofit board chairmanship. Cooper's ruling will define what discovery into the closure decision and the DEMOLISH-poster episode can reach.