President Trump intensified his push to impose a more positive view of American history by moving to curb the independence of the Smithsonian Institution, which he wants to make into a “symbol of inspiration and American greatness.”
In an executive order titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” Mr. Trump took aim at what he described as a “revisionist movement” across the country that “seeks to undermine the remarkable achievements of the United States by casting its founding principles and historical milestones in a negative light.” His order claimed that the Smithsonian, in particular, had “come under the influence of a divisive, race-centered ideology” and that it promotes “narratives that portray American and Western values as inherently harmful and oppressive.”
Mr. Trump called on Vice President JD Vance, a member of the Smithsonian’s board, to work with Congress to prohibit expenditures on exhibitions or programs that “degrade shared American values, divide Americans by race or promote ideologies inconsistent with federal law.” His executive order also called for making sure that the American Women’s History Museum, which is under development, does not “recognize men as women in any respect.”
The Smithsonian, which has 21 museums, libraries, research centers and the National Zoo, appeared to be caught off-guard by the order. When contacted by a reporter shortly after it was released on Thursday evening, several leaders said they were just learning about the new order themselves. The announcement recalled Mr. Trump’s takeover of the Kennedy Center last month, when he purged Biden appointees from the formerly bipartisan board and installed himself as its chairman.
A spokeswoman for the Smithsonian declined to comment. The institution had closed its diversity office shortly after the president signed a January executive order banning diversity, equity and inclusion programs at organizations receiving federal money. The Smithsonian receives nearly two-thirds of its $1 billion budget from the federal government, as appropriated by Congress.
In another passage of the order that could have sweeping implications, Mr. Trump directed the secretary of the Department of the Interior, which oversees the National Park Service, to determine whether, since 2020, “public monuments, memorials, statues, markers, or similar properties within the Department of the Interior’s jurisdiction have been removed or changed to perpetuate a false reconstruction of American history.”
Instead, the order directs, all properties should “focus on the greatness of the achievements and progress of the American people or, with respect to natural features, the beauty, abundance, and grandeur of the American landscape.” In recent years, many park service sites have updated their interpretive materials to take account of subjects like slavery and the appropriation of Native American lands.
Mr. Trump has broad authority over the Department of the Interior, a part of the executive branch. But efforts to take control of the Smithsonian, which is in the middle of a $2.5 billion capital drive, are more complicated.
The Smithsonian Board of Regents includes business leaders, elected officials, the vice president and the chief justice of the United States. According to the institution’s website, regents nominate new members to six-year terms by a joint resolution of Congress, which is then signed into law by the president. The current chairwoman is Risa J. Lavizzo-Mourey, a geriatrician and health policy expert.
The current secretary of the Smithsonian, Lonnie G. Bunch III, was the founding director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, who has forcefully advocated for what he describes as “nuance and complexity” in history, and warned of continuing backlash against civil rights progress.
Mr. Trump’s order criticized the African American Museum, saying it had “proclaimed that ‘hard work,’ ‘individualism,’ and ‘the nuclear family’ are aspects of ‘White culture.’” In 2020, the museum did include a worksheet with those claims as part of a new Talking About Race online portal. But after it drew criticism, Mr. Bunch ordered it removed.
“I think the document itself was wrong and flawed,” he told a Congressional oversight committee in 2023. “I do think, however, it’s important for the Smithsonian to help the country grapple with questions of race, so I’m not going to run away from that. But I agree with you very much that that document is not the kind of document that should be at the Smithsonian.”
In the executive order, Mr. Trump claimed that the American Women’s History Museum, which is under development, “plans to celebrate male athletes participating in women’s sports.” The museum’s collections and digital exhibits include material about trans women, including the activist Sylvia Rivera, who helped lead the 1969 Stonewall rebellion, and the professional skateboarder Cher Strauberry, who donated one of her skate decks to the museum. But leaders have not released plans for the physical museum, which is still seeking a permanent space on the National Mall.
Laura Raicovich, a former museum executive who wrote a book on the relationship between art, protest and politics, said that the new executive order was a powerful lesson in how governments seek to shape history.
“The order itself is a clear example of the weaponization of language by the administration to undo the necessary historical correctives undertaken by knowledge institutions in recent years,” she said.
Some historians are defending the Smithsonian, which is not just a public museum but also a highly respected research institution. James Grossman, the executive director of the American Historical Association, the country’s largest group of professional historians, said the fact sheet accompanying the order “egregiously misrepresents the work of the Smithsonian.”
“The historical scholarship in the Smithsonian is careful, honest and based on historical evidence,” he said. “Historians draw on that evidence to understand how our nation has evolved. That evolution includes elements that should make us proud. But also elements that we should not be proud of, but from which we should learn.”
The new executive order follows several others early in Mr. Trump’s second term that focus on promoting what Mr. Trump terms “patriotic history,” which he has said should be emphasized during the run-up to the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence in July 2026. The order also specifies that the federal government provide funding for the continuing restoration of Independence Hall in Philadelphia, where the declaration was signed.
Last month, Mr. Trump issued an executive order re-establishing his 1776 Commission, which was disbanded by former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. in January 2021, days after issuing a sweeping report blasting liberal accounts of American history. Another order created a new “Task Force 250,” led by Mr. Trump, that is charged with creating a “grand celebration” for the semiquincentennial, as the 250th anniversary is known.
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