ALSO SEE: Judge Orders Trump to Give 30 Days Notice Before Any Steps to Demolish Kennedy Center

Rep. Joyce Beatty asked a federal judge to clarify that the center cannot be torn down after images surfaced of the president reviewing what appeared to be a printout related to its demolition.

A lawmaker challenging President Donald Trump’s transformation of the Kennedy Center asked a judge Thursday to make clear that the memorial cannot be unilaterally torn down, pointing to a new photo of Trump reviewing a printout apparently related to its potential demolition.

Trump was photographed aboard Air Force One on Wednesday night examining a large printout about the Kennedy Center whose partially visible title appeared to read “Kennedy Center DEMOLIS[HED],” hours after he warned that the performing arts venue could eventually be “ripped down” without his intervention.

The photographs, taken by AFP photojournalist Brendan Smialowski after Air Force One landed at Joint Base Andrews, show Trump looking down at the large printout through an aircraft window. The beginning of a red headline reading “Kennedy Center DEMOLIS” is visible, but the rest of the word and other portions of the document are obscured.

Lawyers representing Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio), a Kennedy Center trustee suing her fellow board members, argued that the images and Trump’s remarks show he is “actively considering demolition of the entire structure.” They asked the court to make “crystal clear that its order prohibits demolishing the structure.”

U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper on Thursday turned down Beatty’s request for an emergency hearing, but ordered a detailed status update by Sept. 23. He also ordered the center to provide more than 30 days’ notice of any change in its construction plans, including any prospect of demolition.

The photographs of Trump do not establish what the printout proposed, who prepared it or whether Trump or his administration is considering demolishing all or part of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

The White House on Thursday did not answer questions about the printout and whether demolition is under consideration, but said in a statement, “For years, Democrats let the Kennedy Center rot. … As President Trump said last night, without his intervention, The Kennedy Center will inevitably continue to decline.”

But one of the images quickly entered the escalating legal battle over the center’s future. Beatty filed the photograph in federal court Thursday morning as “evidence that came to light last night,” saying the placard appeared to read “Kennedy Center DEMOLISHED.” The lawyers paired the photograph with remarks Trump made hours earlier in North Carolina, where he argued that his administration deserves recognition at the Kennedy Center if it is going to rescue and financially support the troubled institution.

“For us as an administration to want to do that, I think the Trump administration should be recognized,” Trump told reporters. “Because frankly, if we don’t do that, it’s going to close, it will end up being ripped down.”

The new filing comes at a chaotic moment for the national cultural institution. Its main building has been closed to the public since Tuesday afternoon, when its Trump-led board voted to shutter it immediately for roughly two years of renovations. But a federal judge made clear hours earlier that officials needed his approval before implementing the board’s proposed long-term closure.

Kennedy Center officials told Cooper on Thursday that the shutdown now underway is not an implementation of the board’s two-year closure vote. Executive Director Matt Floca said in a sworn declaration that he independently decided Wednesday to close most public areas for seven days because continued structural deterioration posed “acute risks to public safety.”

Floca also offered a new explanation for the center’s abrupt evacuation Tuesday evening, hours after trustees voted to close the building “forthwith.” An announcement over the center’s speakers telling people to leave and saying the building was closed resulted from an improperly triggered alarm, Floca said.

“I did not authorize that alarm, nor am I aware of a legitimate reason why that alarm may have been triggered,” Floca said, adding that center employees were investigating what happened.

Justice Department lawyers argued that Cooper’s existing injunction does not prohibit such a temporary emergency closure and asked him to forgo a hearing. They said the center still plans to ask Cooper to dissolve his order so a full closure can proceed.

Beatty’s lawyers challenged that explanation Thursday, accusing center officials of retroactively devising a rationale to conceal their intention to shut the building for two years in violation of Cooper’s order. They pointed to the timing: The center abruptly closed Tuesday afternoon after trustees voted to shutter it immediately and roughly 90 minutes after Trump said the closure “will take place immediately.”

They also argued that center officials had identified no new, urgent danger that would explain Floca’s emergency shutdown, noting that the center had already cordoned off areas officials said were dangerous.

Beatty’s lawyers also questioned whether the shutdown would actually last seven days, noting that Floca told employees he would reevaluate the closure weekly and extend it if necessary.

“Their rationale that they are only temporarily closing the Kennedy Center is a plain pretext to justify shutting down the Center permanently,” lawyers Nathaniel Zelinsky and Norm Eisen wrote Thursday.

The Trump administration had previously characterized the prospect of demolition as a hypothetical consequence of failing to renovate the 55-year-old building.

In an August court filing, Justice Department lawyers representing the center argued that it would deteriorate into an “unsafe, decrepit structure” that would eventually be “required to be taken down” without Trump’s leadership, fundraising and proposed renovation. They floated replacing it with a large outdoor amphitheater overlooking the Potomac River, while acknowledging such a replacement would “fail to adequately honor” President John F. Kennedy.

At the time, a Kennedy Center spokesperson said the language described “a hypothetical scenario” of what could happen if the renovation were blocked.

On Tuesday, Cooper barred the center from carrying out an Aug. 13 plan to inscribe “Restored and Renovated by President Donald J. Trump” on the building’s facade and rename its grounds “President Donald J. Trump Plaza.” Cooper reiterated his earlier ruling that Congress reserved the national memorial for honoring Kennedy and that trustees cannot memorialize Trump there without congressional approval.

Hours later, Trump said the center would close immediately but that the roughly $250 million renovation “cannot begin until such time as the D.C. Circuit rules on the Board’s approved name.” If the center ultimately loses the naming dispute, including at the Supreme Court, Trump said, “the Reconstruction and the Renovation of The Kennedy Center will not take place.”

There have been just a few events lately, held at the center’s nearby Reach complex, but the week’s turmoil caused one artist to pull out.

On Wednesday, the indie pop band Matt Pond PA announced that it was canceling its free Thursday night show, saying performing there “would feel like an endorsement of the administration’s actions.”

“The decision to shut down the main building, and the disregard shown toward the artists, crews, and audiences who make the Center what it is, has created a level of chaos and uncertainty that we don’t feel comfortable supporting,” the group said on Instagram.

“So much trouble,” the band added, “all because the president wants his name on the building.”