❓WHAT HAPPENED: Kennedy Center president Richard Grenell is ripping a report from The New York Times, sourced entirely from a group of Democrat Senators, as “careless attacks” that “did not undergo basic fact-checking.”

👤WHO WAS INVOLVED: The New York Times, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), the Kennedy Center, Richard Grenell, and the Trump administration.

📍WHEN & WHERE: The NYT report was published late Thursday, with Kennedy Center president Richard Grenell responding in a letter to Sen. Whitehouse.

💬KEY QUOTE: “I am concerned about your careless attacks on me and my team. The letter you signed did not undergo basic fact-checking. It is filled with partisan attacks and false accusations. Your staff relied on anonymous sources, inaccurate gossip, and allegations from partisan reporters who never had access to the data or facts…” — Richard Grenell

🎯IMPACT: The report, authored by the NYT‘s Katie Benner, is entirely reliant on the word of a letter sent to Grenell by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI)—one of the most partisan lawmakers on Capitol Hill, with a long reputation of abusing his office to pursue personal grudges and politically advantageous lawfare.

Kennedy Center president Richard Grenell is ripping a report from The New York Times, and sourced entirely from a group of Democrat Senators, as “careless attacks” that “did not undergo basic fact-checking.” The report, authored by the NYT‘s Katie Benner and published late Thursday afternoon, is entirely reliant on the word of a letter sent to Grenell by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI)—one of the most partisan lawmakers on Capitol Hill, with a long reputation of abusing his office to pursue personal grudges and politically advantageous lawfare.

While Sen. Whitehouse and his staff, in collusion with Benner and the NYT, attempted to paint a picture of malfeasance by the Trump administration’s management of the Kennedy Center, the performing arts center’s president, Richard Grenell, has laid out a series of concrete facts rebutting them. “I am concerned about your careless attacks on me and my team. The letter you signed did not undergo basic fact-checking. It is filled with partisan attacks and false accusations. Your staff relied on anonymous sources, inaccurate gossip, and allegations from partisan reporters who never had access to the data or facts I’m happy to provide below,” Grenell writes.

“The individual who had the job before me was getting paid $1,210,635 per year. There were 94 people employed in the Development Department (today, there are 16). And the deferred maintenance of the building was quite literally making the building fall apart,” Grenell contends, continuing: “Today, and for the first time in decades, we have a balanced budget at the Kennedy Center. There was no reference to these facts in your letter.”

While the New York Times report, based on Whitehouse’s staff investigation, claim the Kennedy Center has cancelled programming in lieu of other events, Grenell responds, “We have not cancelled shows. We have installed a break-even policy for programming and rentals writ large. I established a new policy that all events must be revenue neutral.”

“This means that if our ticket-sales modeling did not cover all the costs of the program, then the program or rental could not be confirmed without a generous donor or sponsor to make up the deficit. In all the rental examples you mention, we have had donors or sponsors cover in excess of the total costs,” he notes.

Addressing a specific claim that the Kennedy Center discounted the use of space for the FIFA World Cup drawing, Grenell demolishes the NYT’s report. “FIFA has given us several million dollars, in addition to paying all of the expenses for this event in lieu of a rental fee. Your focus on simple rental fees is no way to run an institution as diverse as the Kennedy Center. A simple rental fee would not have been enough to cover the magnitude of the event,” he writes.

Grenell’s letter goes on to defend several staff hirings of individuals who are currently filling the roles of several former staffers, generating savings for the Kennedy Center. Additionally, Grenell reveals that a NewsNation event, even though it was painted as a partisan event favoring President Trump, “was a bipartisan event featuring host Chris Cuomo, Senator John Fetterman, and Stephen A. Smith.”

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