Donald Trump’s name has barely been scrubbed from one Washington landmark, and now there’s another legal fight over putting it on a different one.
Ousted board members of the U.S. Institute of Peace filed an emergency motion Thursday asking a federal judge to stop the Trump administration from carving the president’s name into the facade of the institute’s historic headquarters in Washington, D.C.
The dispute centers on the building that houses the U.S. Institute of Peace, a nonprofit organization created by Congress in 1984 to promote the peaceful resolution of international conflicts.
The request comes after the State Department announced last December that the building had been renamed the “Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace.”
Trump’s name was simply slapped onto the building, while “Institute of Peace” remains permanently etched into the structure itself.
The department celebrated the change on X with the message: “Welcome to the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace. The best is yet to come.”
Now the former board members want a judge to make sure Trump’s name doesn’t become physically embedded in the building.
The emergency motion asks the court to block any “plans to carve President Trump’s name into the facade of the iconic USIP headquarters building,” arguing that the structure was designed as “expressive architecture” intended to represent the institute’s independent mission.
Altering that design to send a different message, the filing argues, would cause “irreparable harm.”
And there’s another layer to the controversy.
While Secretary of State Marco Rubio has referred to Trump as the “president of peace,” Trump’s administration had already moved to dismantle the organization itself.
In February 2025, Trump signed an executive order calling for the Institute of Peace to be dismantled as part of his administration’s effort to reduce what it described as government waste. The move resulted in mass firings and a continuing legal battle over the organization’s future.
So now the institute’s former board members are fighting in court over whether the president’s name should be permanently carved into the headquarters of an organization his administration tried to dismantle.
And the broader public doesn’t appear particularly enthusiastic about the idea of turning government buildings into Trump monuments.
A Pew Research Center survey conducted in April found that just 9% of Americans said it would be acceptable to name government buildings after Trump while he is serving as president. Meanwhile, 50% said it would not be acceptable at all.
The question has become particularly relevant after Trump’s name was added to the Kennedy Center last year.
Trump’s handpicked board voted to rename the performing arts center after him, but U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper later ruled that the board had exceeded its authority.
“Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name,” Cooper wrote. “Only Congress can change it.”
The judge ordered Trump’s name removed from the building, and the administration subsequently told the court that the signage had been taken down.
This week, Cooper ordered the Kennedy Center to provide at least 30 days’ notice before making major physical changes to the building, including demolition, after Trump had warned that the landmark could ultimately be “ripped down.”
Now another Washington landmark is caught up in a battle over Trump’s name.
