Sixteen “members of a presidential arts and humanities panel resigned on Friday in … protest of President Trump’s recent comments on the violence in Charlottesville,” writes Ed O’Keefe in Friday’s (8/18) Washington Post. “Members of the President’s Committee are drawn from Broadway, Hollywood, and the broader arts and entertainment community and said in a letter to Trump that ‘Your words and actions push us all further away from the freedoms we are guaranteed.’ … The commission was established by President Ronald Reagan in 1982. It is among the dozens of mostly ceremonial White House commissions that advise the president on issues ranging from business matters to education policy and physical fitness. … Their decision comes after two White House corporate advisory boards also disbanded this week in protest of the president’s comments.” Members who resigned include painter and photographer Chuck Close, author Jhumpa Lahiri, actor Kal Penn, director George C. Wolfe, architect Thom Mayne, and Jersey Boys actor John Lloyd Young. The President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities consists of public and private members, with public members consisting of the heads of twelve federal agencies with cultural programs, and private members including artists, actors, musicians, scholars, philanthropists, and businesspeople.
Posted August 18, 2017
