Fast-Moving Comedian Owns trumpkennedycenter.org

Workers put up signage announcing a new name for the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington on Friday. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

A satirist moved faster than the rebranding team at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts when it came to securing a web address that reflected its name change. After the center’s board voted Thursday to rename the Washington, DC, institution the Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, comedy writer Toby Morton pointed out that he already owned the two most logical URLs: trumpkennedycenter.org and trumpkennedycenter.com, the Washington Post reports, because he saw this coming.

Morton, who has written for South Park and Mad TV, said he bought the domains in August, anticipating that President Trump’s growing influence over the institution would extend to its name. Morton runs about 50 politically themed domains as parody sites, which he describes as a form of activism rather than a business. His previous efforts include NancyMace26.com, which mimics a campaign site for Rep. Nancy Mace before pivoting into mocking “words of wisdom,” and MTG2026.org, which attacks Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene. He also operates a fake MAGA dating site and ResignChuck.com, aimed at Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. Morton funds his projects partly through donations and says he occasionally consults lawyers to keep his work within legal bounds.

The comedian declined to detail how the Trump-Kennedy Center domains, which are blank now, will be used but said the sites will “reflect the absurdity of the moment.” No one from Trump’s orbit has contacted him about acquiring the addresses, he said, though he has heard from “a few random lawyers” claiming satire is now illegal. “The Kennedy Center has always been a cultural institution meant to outlast any one administration or personality,” he writes. “It’s meant to honor culture, not ego. Once it was treated like personal branding, satire became unavoidable.”

https://www.newser.com/story/380731/fast-moving-comedian-owns-trumpkennedycenterorg.html