The White House in a brand new report accused leaders of the Smithsonian Institution of adopting a divisive, far-left ideological framework that erases American heritage, marking the newest transfer by the Trump administration to reshape US cultural and historic establishments.
In the report, revealed Saturday on the 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding, the White House Domestic Policy Council says the Smithsonian has moved its mission “away from straightforward historical education and scholarship toward an extreme political activism that seeks to transform our country.”
During President Donald Trump’s second administration, the world’s largest museum establishment and a key voice in shaping the narrative of America’s historical past has been under pressure to take away “woke” ideology, although it operates as a novel public-private belief and doesn’t contemplate itself an govt company.
“For more than 180 years, the Smithsonian has served the American public with nonpartisan and independent scholarship, and we remain committed to doing so,” a Smithsonian spokesperson advised NCS on Sunday.
NCS has reached out to the White House to ask what the administration plans to do with the report.
The 162-page doc follows a March 2025 govt order titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” which sought to fight what the White House calls “historical revisions” that forged the nation’s historical past in a destructive mild. The order set off adjustments to cultural establishments throughout the nation together with nationwide parks and monuments. As a outcome, Trump’s aides have been tasked with rooting out what it considers anti-American propaganda on the establishment.
The White House report alleges the management on the National Museum of American History, particularly, has been captured by a “radical, activist ideology” that’s in opposition of the nation’s “noble, honest story.” The report hinges on a number of key findings, together with an absence of consideration paid to America’s founders, academic supplies on gender fluidity and a campaign towards “whiteness.”
The White House ordered a comprehensive internal review of reveals and supplies on the Smithsonian Institution final August, putting a big emphasis on making certain “alignment with the President’s directive to celebrate American exceptionalism.”
Lonnie Bunch III, Secretary of the Smithsonian, advised NCS in a May interview that the establishment has maintained its autonomy even because it has “given everything that’s been asked” by the White House for its evaluate.
After largely staying out of the general public eye, Bunch just lately helped curate an exhibition — a show to mark America’s 250th birthday. The White House report, nevertheless, criticizes the museum’s management for “intentionally withholding and subverting” the nation’s central story. The report says that the museum deliberately veers away from an “America First” viewpoint in historical past.
Bunch, a historian and the primary Black American to function head of the Smithsonian, mentioned in May that the administration didn’t play any half in his considering or alternatives for the “American Aspirations” exhibitition on the Smithsonian citadel that celebrated the nation’s 250th birthday.
“My goal is that history is driven by scholarship, not partisanship,” he mentioned. “The Smithsonian always does its own scholarship. It’s always driven by that. We have always worked with different administrations, but it’s always about what our scholarship tells us.”