Donald Trump announced on Friday that he is appointing himself as chairman of the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, adding that he is immediately terminating multiple people from the board of trustees and the current chairman.

“At my direction, we are going to make the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., GREAT AGAIN,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.

The Kennedy Center is the country’s national cultural center and is run through a public-private partnership. The idea for such a center began with Eleanor Roosevelt in the 1930s and was authorized by Congress in 1958 . It’s doors officially opened in 1971. The center is known for hosting music, theater, dance, artwork and performance art, and has hosted acts ranging from Tina Turner to Led Zeppelin.

A spokesperson for the Kennedy Center said in a statement it was aware of Trump’s Truth Social post, but that it had “received no official communications from the White House regarding changes to our board of trustees”.

Some members of the board have received termination notices from the administration, the spokesperson said.

The Kennedy Center’s current chairman is David Rubenstein, a billionaire philanthropist and the co-founder of the private equity firm the Carlyle Group. Rubenstein has held the position since 2010 and was set to retire this year. After Trump was elected, the Kennedy Center said it had failed to find a new chair to replace Rubenstein and that he would stay on until September 2026.

Rubenstein served as a policy adviser to Jimmy Carter and is reportedly close to Joe Biden. He was first appointed by George W Bush.

Members of the board of trustees are typically appointed by the president. Currently, the attorney general Pam Bondi, lobbyist Brian Ballard and singer Lee Greenwood – all Trump supporters – are on the board, according to the Hill. Several Biden appointees are still on the board too, including press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre. First ladies are honorary members and Congress can also designate ex-officio members.

“We have had a collaborative relationship with every presidential administration,” the Kennedy Center spokesperson said, adding that it has long had “a bipartisan board of trustees that has supported the arts in a non-partisan fashion”.

Rubenstein’s position, which Trump says he is now seizing, has always been appointed by the center’s board members, according to the act authorized by Congress in 1958.

“There is nothing in the center’s statute that would prevent a new administration from replacing board members,” the center’s spokesperson said. “However, this would be the first time such action has been taken with the Kennedy Center’s board.”

Trump said the reason for terminating Rubenstein and some members of the board of trustees is that they don’t “share our Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture”. In his Truth Social post, he also brought up the topic of queer people, something he has raised repeatedly since being sworn into office, saying that the Kennedy Center “featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth – THIS WILL STOP”.

The Atlantic first reported Trump’s decision to appoint himself as chairman of the Kennedy Center. During his first term, he didn’t attend a single annual gala event at center – a tradition US presidents have long partaken in. Trump had a prickly relationship with the center after artists protested against his administration and threatened to boycott events at the White House.

Now, it seems, Trump wants back in. Capping off his Truth Social post, he wrote: “THE BEST IS YET TO COME!”