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President Donald Trump issued an executive order this past weekend demanding new signage outside the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History (NMAH), due to what his administration has alleged are displays that demonstrate an unpatriotic view of the past.
The signs will “warn” visitors about a supposed “ideological capture” of the NMAH. They also claim that the museum’s displays depict historical events using a “radical view of American history.”
The latest action follows 16 months of the Trump administration pressuring the Smithsonian Institution to change its content, threatening to review current exhibits and cut off funding for the museums unless they adhere to the White House’s standards. The effort has resulted in the ouster of at least one museum director.
The Smithsonian is not governed by a single branch of government, making the administration’s demands highly unusual and likely unprecedented. Instead, the museums are managed by a board of regents, which includes members from all three branches of government, as well as nine additional citizen members.
Trump’s executive order issued on Friday calls for the Interior Department and the National Park Service (NPS) to “install temporary signage” along sidewalks at the NMAH to inform passersby of a report issued by the administration regarding the accuracy of the museum’s exhibits. That report claims that “the Smithsonian leadership does not present American history as a shared national inheritance to be taught and celebrated, but instead views American history as a ‘prime tool’ to advance ideas of social justice and the radical transformation of our society.”
The Trump administration’s allegations are ironic, given that Trump himself demonstrably lied to the American public tens of thousands of times during his first term in office, and has continued to lie during his second term.
During a congressional hearing last week, NMAH director Anthea Hartig denied that the museum’s exhibits are ideological. Said Hartig:
Our work is governed by the Smithsonian standards of scholarship, accuracy, independence, and nonpartisanship. The museum does not take sides in America’s political debates. We preserve and document the evidence of American life in all of its breadth, so that the public can encounter the past and draw their own conclusions.
The claims by the White House do not “fairly or accurately” represent the museum’s standards, Hartig added.
Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-New Mexico), ranking Democrat on the Oversight Committee, blasted the administration for targeting truthful exhibits at the museum.
“This EO is a clear political overreach, driven by an ideological agenda to rewrite American history,” Stansbury said on social media. “Our Smithsonian institutions do not belong to the President, but to the American people and so does our nation’s history.”
American Historical Association executive director Sarah Weicksel also criticized the executive order, noting that there is “no precedent” of a president demanding that a museum “present a completely alternative narrative” — one based on a “very narrow and very circumscribed definition of patriotism.”
The executive order is “an absolute affront to the professionals who work in that building,” Weicksel added in comments shared with The Washington Post.
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