April 07 2026, 08:15 
A gay journalist says he was detained by Kennedy Center security after booing President Donald Trump at the opening night of Chicago last week.
Eugene Ramirez, a former lead anchor for Sinclair Broadcast Group’s national evening news, who resigned from his position in early 2024 over concerns about the company’s conservative bias, told The Washington Blade that he attended last Tuesday’s performance with friends. Ramirez said he was hoping “to enjoy a final performance in the Kennedy Center as we know it” before the embattled institution shuts down for two years of renovations.
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The president and first lady were also in attendance, arriving just before the performance to cheers and applause from some audience members, according to the LGBTQ+ outlet. Ramierez, however, booed. The video he recorded with his phone and shared with the Blade’s Joe Reberkenny also shows the journalist giving the president a thumbs-down.
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Ramirez says he was quickly escorted to the side of the auditorium by Kennedy Center Director of Safety and Security Karles C. Jackson Sr. There, Jackson and several other security staffers detained him until the rest of the audience was seated and the theater’s lights dimmed for the performance.
According to Ramirez, Jackson told him, “They don’t want booing,” noting his thumbs-down gesture, but never clarifying who “they” were. “Mr. Jackson ultimately told me he was just trying to do his job, shook my hand, and allowed me to return to my seat once the lights dimmed and the overture started playing,” Ramirez said.
Ramirez told the Blade that he believes the entire interaction was about optics.
“The White House press pool was there, and it was clear this was an effort to manage the president’s image in the media,” he explained. “It was very clearly about protection — whether protecting the president from visible dissent, or his image before the media present. There was no disruption as almost everyone was standing and reacting loudly to the arrival of the president and first lady, with cheers, applause, and hand gestures. The difference was that my reaction, unlike most, was negative.”
Ramirez noted that his reaction to the president’s presence came before the show started.
“Usually, law enforcement may monitor or intervene if there’s a disruption, but here, there was no disruption at all. Simply expressing dissent in a public, cultural space drew the attention of security,” he said. “It made it feel less like a matter of decorum and more like an effort to control the narrative around the president.”
Ramirez also noted the “irony” of the incident occurring at a performance of Chicago. “The satire truly leapt off the stage!” he said. “A show about controlling the narrative, manipulating the press, and covering up truths by leaning on showmanship and distractions. The show is decades old, but could’ve been written today. We’re being razzle-dazzled daily, and it’s getting harder to tell fact from fiction, no matter where you get your news.”
He said that the incident illustrates “what happens when dissent is treated as disruption rather than a right.”
“Being singled out by security at a federally funded institution for expressing dissent shouldn’t be brushed off; it undermines the First Amendment. Being of Cuban heritage and a journalist, it’s a right I’m not willing to give up readily,” he told the Blade. “Publicly funded cultural institutions should allow visible dissent, even in politically charged moments.”
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