The Kennedy Center has been ordered to pay more than $250,000 in legal fees for jazz musician Chuck Redd after its lawsuit against him was dismissed, according to Rolling Stone.
Washington, D.C. Superior Court Judge Tanya Jones Bosier granted Redd’s request on Monday and set the amount at $252,479.70. The Kennedy Center’s attorneys had argued the figure was too high, but the judge said it was appropriate based on the amount of work Redd’s legal team put into the case.
Redd’s attorney, Lisa J. Banks, said the center filed a meritless lawsuit meant to silence opposition to what she described as the Trump-controlled Kennedy Center’s name change. She said the court was right to dismiss the breach-of-contract case because there was no contract and no damages.
Redd was among several musicians who canceled Kennedy Center appearances after the venue’s board voted to add Trump’s name to the institution. Redd canceled his annual Christmas Eve Jazz Jam, which he had performed there every year since 2006. Then-Kennedy Center president Richard Grenell later threatened to sue him for $1 million, and the center filed the lawsuit in March.
In June, Judge Bosier dismissed the case, finding that Redd had not signed a contract for the 2025 performance and citing Washington, D.C.’s Anti-SLAPP laws, which protect defendants from meritless lawsuits and political retribution. The ruling on legal fees came just days after a federal judge ordered Trump’s name removed from the Kennedy Center, according to Rolling Stone.
