{"id":382740,"date":"2026-01-02T02:19:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-02T02:19:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/382740\/"},"modified":"2026-01-02T02:19:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T02:19:07","slug":"south-park-writer-buys-trump-kennedy-center-domain-name-donald-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/382740\/","title":{"rendered":"South Park writer buys \u2018Trump Kennedy Center\u2019 domain name | Donald Trump"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Donald Trump may be remaking the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts into a pool of his self-reflection, but a writer for South Park, the TV series that better reflects the obsessions and tendencies of the administration than any political pundit, has purchased the rights to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.trumpkennedycenter.org\/\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">trumpkennedycenter.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Toby Morton, a TV writer and producer who has worked on the long-running and joyfully offensive sitcom, said he purchased the domain in August after predicting the president would change the name from the Kennedy Center to the Trump Kennedy Center after he installed himself as chair and stocked the board with loyalists.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">The name change has brought turbulence to the institution, with several performers abruptly pulling out of scheduled concerts in protest. The name change itself is being challenged in the courts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/01\/01\/us\/politics\/trump-kennedy-center-website-toby-morton.html\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">In an email to the New York Times,<\/a> Morton said that for the past five years he\u2019d been \u201cgrabbing domains tied to politicians and authoritarian figures and turning them into blunt, often uncomfortable reflections of what they actually represent\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">\u201cI\u2019ve been doing this kind of work for years now, building sites that mirror and expose political power by using its own language against it,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Visitors to trumpkennedycenter.org find an announcement for a show by the \u201cEpstein dancers\u201d and not a schedule for the center\u2019s line-up of classical music, jazz, theater and ballet.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">\u201cBeginning January 2026, TrumpKennedyCenter.org enters a new era of devotion, unity and inherited authority,\u201d a message on the website says. \u201cWe exist to preserve what must endure, to honor what must not be questioned, and to gather those who understand that greatness is not chosen, it is recognized.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">The real website, <a href=\"https:\/\/kennedy-center.org\/\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">kennedy-center.org<\/a>, is identified as the \u201cTrump Kennedy Center\u201d, but the web address itself is not altered.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Morton is not alone in looking to make fun. A group of British satirists has acquired <a href=\"http:\/\/trump-kennedycenter.org\/\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">trump-kennedycenter.org<\/a> at about the same time, and it is advertising its own brand of deranged comedy misinformation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">\u201cSaucy Jeff \u2013 a Rock\u2019n\u2019Roll Musical,\u201d the website advertises, calling it a \u201cnew adaptation of the St Hubbins\/Smalls-penned rock opera Saucy Jack, [which] brings this musical about friendship and sex crimes right up to date in the new location of Little Saint James, featuring Jeffrey Epstein as the protagonist.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Comedy, more than outrage, has often proved to be a better counter to political lunacy. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/tv-and-radio\/south-park\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" data-component=\"auto-linked-tag\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">South Park<\/a> made its comedy bones parodying the excesses of woke culture.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">But during the second Trump term it has switched firmly to parodying Trump, who in recent episodes has been expecting a baby with a cartoon Satan who thinks the new White House ballroom is going to be a creche.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker explained last year that the Trump administration was inescapable. \u201cIt\u2019s not that we got all political,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/11\/08\/business\/media\/south-park-trump.html\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Parker told the New York Times. <\/a>\u201cIt\u2019s that politics became pop culture.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Morton told the outlet that his view of the Trump Kennedy center name change was that it was an art in itself, perhaps in the same way that Lenin\u2019s tomb in Red Square is better than any piece of installation art could hope to be.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">\u201cIt\u2019s almost performance art in itself,\u201d Morton told the outlet. \u201cThe irony of someone who has openly mocked artists, dismissed culture and shown nothing but contempt for the arts now positioning himself as their steward is kind of breathtaking.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Donald Trump may be remaking the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts into a pool of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":382741,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[88,92],"class_list":{"0":"post-382740","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382740"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382740\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/382741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}