President Donald Trump welcomed the 2025 Kennedy Center honorees to the Oval Office on Saturday, presenting them with their medals and praising them as “perhaps the most accomplished and renowned class” ever selected.
This year’s honorees are actor Sylvester Stallone, singers Gloria Gaynor and George Strait, rock band KISS, and actor-singer Michael Crawford.
Why It’s Significant
In early February, Trump removed the Kennedy Center’s president and chairman, replacing most of the board with political allies who then chose him as the center’s new chairman.
Former president Deborah Rutter was dismissed and later succeeded by Ric Grenell, who previously served as acting director of national intelligence during Trump’s first term. The president’s hands-on role in picking honorees and shifting the medal ceremony to the White House marks a sharp break from longstanding practice, in which a bipartisan committee selected recipients and medals were presented at a State Department dinner.
Key Details
Trump also confirmed he would attend Sunday’s Kennedy Center Honors program, making him the first sitting president to take part in the event after personally reshaping the center’s leadership structure.
The president said he was “about 98% involved” in choosing the 2025 honorees, whom he unveiled himself at the Kennedy Center in August—the first group named under his stewardship. Honorees were previously announced via press release, and the precise process used to select this year’s recipients has not been fully explained.
This year’s Tiffany & Co. medal features a gold disc engraved with an image of the Kennedy Center and rainbow colors on one side, with the honoree’s name and the ceremony date on the other. It hangs from a navy blue ribbon, replacing the earlier design: a large rainbow ribbon adorned with three gold plates.
