The list of musical artists canceling gigs at the Kennedy Center, which Donald Trump has attempted to rename the “Trump-Kennedy Center”, in Washington DC continues to grow.
A second jazz band has pulled out of a New Year’s Eve gig, giving just two days’ notice before the event was set to take place.
This week it was the Cookers, described as a Grammy-nominated, all-star septet of legendary post-bop jazz musicians. The group did not give an explicit reason for their decision but in a statement posted on their website said: “Jazz was born from struggle and from a relentless insistence on freedom: freedom of thought, of expression, and of the full human voice.”
The band’s decision to pull out of A Jazz New Year’s Eve booking comes after the board of the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts voted earlier this month to rename the institution the Trump-Kennedy Center.
The decision provoked outcry – and legal challenges – and the signage outside the Washington DC arts center was quickly amended with Trump’s name. Soon after, drummer and vibraphonist Chuck Redd cancelled a Christmas Eve gig.
Richard Grenell, the Kennedy Center president and a Trump appointee, threatened to sue Redd for $1m in damages for what he called a “political stunt”.
More acts drop Kennedy Center shows after Trump name change
The latest jazz cancellation comes after folk singer Kristy Lee announced she had cancelled a concert at the center scheduled for next month. Lee said on social media that “when American history starts getting treated like something you can ban, erase, rename, or rebrand for somebody else’s ego, I can’t stand on that stage and sleep right at night”.
Judge says Trump administration must continue funding consumer watchdog
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), which supporters say protects US consumers from financial harm by powerful banks, lenders and corporations, is at risk of collapsing after Donald Trump vowed to shutter it since he returned to office this year.
Judge halts ending of temporary protected status for South Sudanese immigrants
The US district judge Angel Kelley in Boston granted an emergency request by several South Sudanese nationals and an immigrant rights’ group to prevent the temporary protected status they had been granted from expiring as planned after 5 January.
The ruling is a temporary victory for immigrant advocates and a setback for the Trump administration’s broader effort to curtail the humanitarian program.
Israeli president’s office denies Trump claim of Netanyahu pardon
The office of Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, has denied a claim by Donald Trump that Benjamin Netanyahu, who is on trial on corruption charges, would soon receive a pardon.
Speaking shortly before his meeting in Florida with the Israeli prime minister on Monday night, Trump said he had been told by Herzog that a pardon was “on its way”.
Iran urges Trump to defy Netanyahu over nuclear talks
Donald Trump should defy Benjamin Netanyahu and realise renewed talks with Iran over its nuclear programme are a better bet and more likely to succeed owing to stronger support in the region for a successful outcome, the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, says in a Guardian article. He also suggests Trump’s Republican base want a deal and not further unnecessary wars.
Trump ‘not worried’ by China’s live-fire Taiwan war game
Donald Trump has said he is not worried by China’s live-fire military drills surrounding Taiwan and that he has a great relationship with the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, who “hasn’t told me anything about it”.
The US president’s comments came amid a large two-day surprise attack simulation launched by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) on Monday and Tuesday, which China has called “Justice Mission 2025”.
What else we’re reading today:
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The man accused of planting pipe bombs outside the headquarters of both the Democratic and Republican National Committees the night before the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol appeared at a federal detention hearing before a magistrate judge on Tuesday.
Read the full report: Suspected DC pipe bomber appears at detention hearing after alleged confession -
Hosting Benjamin Netanyahu for the fifth time since returning to the White House 11 months ago, Donald Trump gave a performance on Monday that provided a microcosm of his now customary disdain for foreign policy protocol.
Read the full analysis: Trump shows customary disdain for protocol as poker-faced Netanyahu watches on -
Tatiana Schlossberg, granddaughter of the 35th US president, John F Kennedy, died on Tuesday after revealing in November she had been diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia. She was 35.
Read the full report: Tatiana Schlossberg, granddaughter of JFK, dies after rare leukemia diagnosis -
Elon Musk claimed he would lead a “department of government efficiency” (Doge) with “maximum transparency” as it set about saving $2tn worth of waste and exposing massive fraud. But with Musk out of the White House, Doge having cut only a tiny fraction of the waste it promised, and dozens of lawsuits alleging violations of privacy and transparency laws, much of what the agency has done remains a mystery. Read the full story: We still don’t really know what Elon Musk’s Doge actually did
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A US citizenship ceremony in Boston earlier this year should have been marked by the joy of overcoming a years-long vetting process. Instead, attendees from nations included on a travel ban list announced by Donald Trump last summer were excluded from taking part, ending their American dream.
Read the full report: Despair for would-be US citizens as American dream blocked by Trump -
While tens of thousands of New Yorkers will be in Times Square for the countdown to 2026, the city’s mayor-elect, Zohran Mamdani, has said he will be sworn into office in an underground midnight private ceremony at an abandoned subway station built during the gilded age.
Read the full report: Mamdani to be sworn in as New York mayor in abandoned subway station
Catching up? Here’s what happened on 29 December 2025.
