Although President John F. Kennedy’s nephew is an ally of President Donald Trump and a former Democrat — Health and Human Services (HHS) Director Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — JFK’s niece, veteran journalist Maria Shriver, is clashing with MAGA Republicans over efforts to rename the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
The Daily Beast’s Leigh Kimmins reports, “JFK’s niece Maria Shriver has blasted the intensifying MAGA makeover of the Kennedy Center. Last week, Republicans on a House panel voted to rename the Center’s opera house after First Lady Melania Trump. Now, Missouri Rep. Bob Onder has proposed renaming the whole building after President Donald Trump.”
Shriver made her feelings abundantly clear in a Monday, July 28 post on X, formerly Twitter.
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Shriver posted, “This is insane. It makes my blood boil. It’s so ridiculous, so petty, so small minded. Truly, what is this about? It’s always about something. ‘Let’s get rid of the Rose Garden. Let’s rename the Kennedy Center.’ What’s next?”
The 69-year-old Shriver, born in 1955, is the daughter of activist/politician Robert Sargent Shriver Jr. and Eunice Kennedy — who was President Kennedy’s sister. Maria Shriver’s uncle was the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy Sr. (D-Massachusetts), and HHS Director RFK Jr. is her cousin. An ex-Democratic turned independent, Shriver was married to actor and former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a moderate Republican and scathing Trump critic.
Kimmins notes that Onder’s bill “would erase” JFK’s “name from the artistic hub,” which was opened in 1971.
Kennedy’s grandson, Jack Schlossberg, is calling Onder out as well.
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In a late July post on Instagram, Schlossberg wrote, “Trump is obsessed with being bigger than JFK, with minimizing the many heroes of our past, as if that elevates him. It doesn’t.”
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Read the full Daily Beast article at this link (subscription required).