Christine Lienert and Debra Wilfong kept their celebratory champagne on ice until 10:30 on Thursday night. But as news emerged that President Trump’s name would not be coming off the front of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as they had hoped, they slipped the bubbly back into the fridge.
There it sits as some in Washington, and the wider world, await the results of a legal battle and Mr. Trump’s next move.
The center is staring down a deadline of Friday to remove the president’s name from the building, based on a federal judge’s order declaring the rebranding unlawful. On Thursday, lawyers for Mr. Trump and the center appealed the decision and sought a stay from the court.
Judge Christopher R. Cooper of Federal District Court in Washington denied their request on Friday afternoon, a couple of hours after workers began erecting scaffolding near the Kennedy Center.
In declining to halt his own order, Judge Cooper said the Kennedy Center had already taken steps to comply with the ruling. Last week, employees were told to “immediately” change forms, social media accounts and email signatures back to the original name. Mr. Trump’s name was soon scrubbed from the top of the center’s official website.
“These efforts undermine the notion that defendants face irreparable harm in complying with the order in full,” the judge wrote.
The Kennedy Center can now appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. But the timeline of such a process is not clear, and legal observers say the judge’s original order suggests that the center has until midnight to take the name down.
In December, the Kennedy Center board voted to put Mr. Trump’s name on the building in recognition of what officials have described as his dedication to the institution and his help in securing $257 million to finance what the center’s board said was a much needed renovation.
The 18 letters added to the building have irked many in the months since. Should Mr. Trump lose his battle to halt the judge’s order, “we’re ready to roll,” Ms. Lienert said. “We’ll reload the cooler and come right over” to toast their removal.
The couple live in the Watergate complex next door to the Kennedy Center, where life revolves around its events, restaurant and grounds. Ms. Lienert says that she took a poll at a recent gathering for new residents, and many of them said the Kennedy Center was the reason they moved in. Some are keeping vigil over the signage on the marble, grilling anyone who looks knowledgeable for the latest on its fate.
Early Friday morning a jogger ran up the sun-blasted granite steps leading to the building’s front entrance, craning his neck toward the facade. Seeing the sign still there, he trotted back down, shaking his head as he dug out his phone, ostensibly to share an update.
Bike rack barricades, erected on Thursday afternoon, still surround the disputed section of facade, where security guards, photographers and television camera operators mill about.
Residents and tourists walk past or ride up on bicycles and scooters, asking anyone with a camera or a badge what is happening. Some pause for selfies with a sign that most believe will not remain on the building for long.
Two volunteer organizations that were created after the major changes at the center — Hands Off the Arts and Free the Kennedy Center — teamed up to livestream the signage on the building. One member offered a balcony at the Watergate to host the webcam, which was installed on Monday night.
“It’s our little piece of magic,” said Mallory Miller, who co-founded Hands Off the Arts. Ms. Miller was an assistant manager in the dance programming department when Mr. Trump gutted the center’s board and took over as chair, and she started a union organizing drive with her co-workers. She was fired from the center in August.
On Friday, Chris Raleigh, co-founder of Hands Off the Arts, was monitoring a second webcam closer to the action, which captured the scaffolding as it rose.
“We’ve kind of leaned into keeping the vigil,” he said, “making sure the place is protected and that someone’s watching it, and people on YouTube seem to be doing that, even in the middle of the night.”
Allerton Kilborn, 79, brought a book to occupy him on Friday while he waited for what he hoped would be the removal of the lettering. He had traveled to the center from his home in Chevy Chase, Md.
“For the adventure of it — this is history,” he said.
“I’m so old that I once met John Kennedy and have been an enormous fan of his,” he said. He said he thought the addition of Mr. Trump’s name been a desecration of the memorial to Kennedy.
“I’m not religious,” he said, “but I see it in religious terms.”
