CBS News aired the Kennedy Center Honors on Tuesday using a sharply edited Donald Trump monologue and dodging his controversial “Trump Kennedy Center” rebrand.
The new Trump-appointed Kennedy Center board voted on Dec. 18 to rename the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as the “Trump-Kennedy Center,” leading to almost immediate legal action.
Despite the 79-year-old president trying to muscle the rebrand into the country’s living rooms while hosting what he called “THE TRUMP KENNEDY CENTER HONORS” on Tuesday evening, CBS aired the 48th Kennedy Center Honors with the institution’s long-standing name, noted The Washington Post.
Behind the scenes, the paper said CBS News standards had circulated guidance telling staff to stick with “Kennedy Center,” noting the board’s vote alone doesn’t make the change official because Congress would have to approve it.
The network also trimmed Trump’s opening remarks from roughly 12 minutes to about two minutes for viewers at home, cutting out some of his freewheeling asides—including his crack at the laughing crowd as “miserable, horrible people.”
The on-air snub came as CBS’s relationship with Trump has taken repeated hits, often with 60 Minutes at the center.
In July, Paramount, the network’s parent company, agreed to pay $16 million to Trump’s presidential library to settle his $20 billion lawsuit over what he claimed was deceptive editing of a Kamala Harris interview, a deal the company announced without an apology.
Since then, Trump has continued his attack on the network, even as CBS has been accused of bending over backwards to placate him. In November, it aired a 28-minute version of a Trump 60 Minutes sit-down with Norah O’Donnell, as well as a separate 73-minute extended cut.
Yet it left out a tense exchange in which Trump expressed irritation over questions about a crypto mogul he pardoned amid reports of a $2 billion deal tied to a Trump family crypto venture. The edits also omitted Trump’s comment about CBS’s payout related to the settlement.
Then came the network’s leadership turmoil. After Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison, 42, installed Bari Weiss, 41, as CBS News editor-in-chief in October, the MAGA-curious boss spiked a 60 Minutes segment at the eleventh hour last weekend.
It featured interviews with deportees sent by the Trump administration to a notorious megaprison in El Salvador, with Weiss claiming the segment needed more work before it could air. Her last-minute decision sparked concerns of White House interference and triggered fury inside the newsroom.
The episode spiraled further when the segment surfaced anyway after a Canadian broadcaster aired it, and Paramount Skydance began issuing copyright takedowns to scrub reposts.
Set against concerns over political pressure and corporate leverage, the network’s refusal to call the venue the “Trump Kennedy Center” on its biggest annual cultural broadcast—and cutting Trump’s screen time—has raised more than a few eyebrows.
The Daily Beast has contacted CBS and the Kennedy Center for comment.
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