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A fired arts programmer says mass dismissals amount to censorship as the venue undergoes major renovations.
WASHINGTON — A former Kennedy Center employee will lead a protest on the steps of the nation’s premier performing arts venue on Saturday, pushing back against what she describes as the politicization of the historic institution.
Mallory Miller, who worked for more than two years as part of the Kennedy Center’s dance programming team, was fired in August following what she says were conflicts with President Donald Trump’s newly appointed executive director, Richard Grenell, over programming changes. Miller believes her dismissal was retaliation for union organizing.
“One of the best things that unions can do for you is take you from being an at-will employee to being a for-cause employee, and when the president decided to take over the Kennedy Center in February, it felt like we might all lose our jobs,” Miller told WUSA9. “Our leadership was all fired in one day.”
Mass dismissals follow leadership change
Miller says widespread firings began in February shortly after the leadership shake-up at the Kennedy Center. She claims programmers in social impact, international programming, dance and jazz were among those dismissed.
“Myself and all of dance programming fired in August, quickly followed by the dismissal of jazz programming curation and also the curator of Millennium Stage, which is one of the Kennedy Center’s most popular programs,” Miller said. “And so I have to draw the conclusion that if you’re firing curators, what you’re actually doing is censoring art.”
The programmers, Miller argues, are the people who maintain relationships with artists and ensure world-class programming continues at the venue.
Saturday protest planned
At 1 p.m. Saturday, Miller will lead a group of dancers in what she calls a stand against partisan interference in the arts. The demonstration, organized through her group Hands Off the Arts, will feature a dance performance. More information is available on Instagram at @HandsOfftheArts or at handsoffthearts.org.
This will not be the first protest over changes at the Kennedy Center. A similar demonstration took place in February.
Kennedy Center defends changes
In a statement to WUSA9, Kennedy Center Vice President of Public Relations Roma Daravi did not directly address the protest, Miller’s firing or staffing changes.
“As America’s cultural center, the Kennedy Center welcomes everyone who wants to celebrate the arts,” Daravi said. “Thanks to commonsense management, our teams are hard at work restoring and renovating the building so that families and visitors can continue to enjoy accessible programming for generations to come.”
This summer, Trump helped secure $257 million in funding from Congress for renovations at the Kennedy Center, which are already underway. In a speech, Trump said the administration “ended the woke political programming” at the venue.
This week, a Kennedy Center spokesperson pointed to the announcement of the venue’s first-ever Christmas tree and a Christmas spectacular, “Noel: Jesus is Born!” as examples of revamped programming.
Concerns over ticket sales
However, the New York Times obtained documents showing a 50% year-over-year drop in ticket sales during a typical week in October, raising questions about audience response to the changes.
Miller insists that renovations and new programming won’t compensate for what has been lost during the year of turnover.
“The Kennedy Center are the people, those brilliant arts administrators that I helped to organize into a labor union earlier this year, and it’s also the audiences and the artists,” Miller said. “It’s so much bigger than just a building on the Potomac.”
Warning sign for other institutions
Miller views what’s happening at the Kennedy Center as a warning sign for other cultural institutions in the Washington region. She points to changes already underway at organizations like the Smithsonian and National Portrait Gallery as evidence of broader interference in the arts.
President Trump maintains he is restoring the Kennedy Center as the premier venue for performing arts anywhere in the world.
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