Trump Administration Plan to Oversee Smithsonian Exhibits Draws Criticism From Historians

Historians and free speech advocates have begun to speak out to express their alarm at the White House’s announcement of a wide-ranging review of exhibits at the Smithsonian Institution’s museums and galleries.

The free expression group PEN America said it feared the review “will rewrite history and strip truth from exhibits,” while Sarah Weicksel, the executive director of the American Historical Association, described the Trump administration move as a “major overstep.”

Ms. Weicksel, who leads the country’s largest group of professional historians, said she had been hearing from some of its more than 10,000 members who said they have deep concerns.

“Only historians and trained museum professionals are qualified to conduct such a review, which is intended to ensure historical accuracy,” she said. “To suggest otherwise is an affront to the professional integrity of curators, historians, educators and everyone involved in the creation of solid, evidence-based content.”

The White House’s announced review is a challenge to the Smithsonian, which has traditionally operated as an independent institution and regards itself as being outside the control of the executive branch. It is governed by a 17-member Board of Regents that includes Democrats and Republicans and is overseen by Congress.

Earlier this year, when Mr. Trump announced that he was firing the director of the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery, the institution asserted in a statement that it holds the power over personnel. The regents did agree, though, to have the institution perform its own internal review of content for possible bias or partisanship. That review is ongoing, and the museum director, Kim Sajet, resigned shortly afterward.

The White House said the review is aimed at portraying a more uplifting view of American history, but the administration has not specified who would be involved in evaluating the Smithsonian content. The White House did say the review would involve collaboration among museum staff, administration officials and personnel from other agencies, though it did not say what those other agencies are.

Mr. Trump has been at odds with historians since his first term, when many criticized his push to promote what he sees as “patriotic history.” Early in his second term, he stirred deep alarm when he issued an executive order, titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” which criticized 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.”

That order claimed that the Smithsonian, in particular, had “come under the influence of a divisive, race-centered ideology.” It directed Vice President JD Vance, a member of the Smithsonian’s board, to take action to redirect it toward promoting “American greatness.”

Under the review, announced in a letter sent to Lonnie G. Bunch III, the secretary of the Smithsonian, the museums will be required to adjust any content that the administration finds problematic within 120 days, “replacing divisive or ideologically driven language with unifying, historically accurate and constructive descriptions.”

Hadar Harris, managing director of PEN America’s Washington, D.C., office, said that curators and historians should be able to work without political interference.

“The administration’s efforts to rewrite history are a betrayal of our democratic traditions and a deeply concerning effort to strip truth from the institutions that tell our national story, from the Smithsonian to our national parks,” she said. “The ideas and presentation of history cannot be subject to the whims of a single leader or administration.”

Mr. Bunch, the founding director of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, who has a doctorate in history, commands considerable respect across the profession. In June, he was elected president of the American Historical Association, for a term set to begin in January 2027.

Joy Connolly, the president of the American Council of Learned Societies, said that the moves against the Smithsonian are consistent with Mr. Trump’s broader campaign against universities and the idea of independent expertise they represent.

“What is truly uplifting about the Smithsonian is not the material in its exhibits,” she said in a message to affiliates on Wednesday. “What uplifts us is its existence as a collective of experts committed to the advancement of the public’s understanding, maintained by taxpayers, because we believe in investing in the advancement of knowledge.”

Some critics of the Smithsonian on the right, however, welcomed the review. In a series of posts on X, Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation who has often written critically about the Smithsonian, praised the White House move.

“Given the Smithsonian’s behavior in the past few years — how it cataloged everything woke, how it gave the communist leader Angela Davis plenty of space, but not Justice Clarence Thomas, how it portrayed America in a poor light — this White House review is not a minute too soon,” he wrote.

The letter was signed by Lindsey Halligan, a special assistant to the president; Vince Haley, the director of the Domestic Policy Council; and Russell T. Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget. Ms. Halligan was previously named in President Trump’s March executive order, where she was tasked with putting his Smithsonian policies into effect. Mr. Haley, a longtime speechwriter for Mr. Trump who is now his top domestic policy adviser, is overseeing White House efforts to shape next year’s commemoration of the 250th, as well as plans for Mr. Trump’s proposed National Garden of American Heroes.

A longtime budget expert, Mr. Vought earlier helped sketch out a vision for expansive presidential power and the reshaping of the federal government in Project 2025, the conservative blueprint prepared by the Heritage Foundation for Mr. Trump.

The Smithsonian, which operates a complex of 21 museums, plus libraries, research centers and the National Zoo, draws 62 percent of its more than $1 billion annual budget from congressional appropriation, federal grants and government contracts.

The letter asks the Smithsonian to focus on what it calls “Americanism,” which it defines as “the people, principles, and progress that define our nation.”

In the letter, the White House said the review “aims to ensure alignment with the president’s directive to celebrate American exceptionalism, remove divisive or partisan narratives and restore confidence in our shared cultural institutions.”

It added that the “goal is not to interfere with the day-to-day operations of curators or staff, but rather to support a broader vision of excellence that highlights historically accurate, uplifting and inclusive portrayals of America’s heritage.”

The review will begin with eight of the Smithsonian’s museums, but others will be added to the review in a later phase, the White House said.

Dean Sobel, a museum studies professor at the University of Denver, said the spotlight will now fall on the degree to which the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents pushes back or goes along with the administration. “It goes to the highest level, the board,” he said. “We are testing the powers the government has and what powers the institutions themselves have.”

The fact that the Smithsonian relies so heavily on federal funding makes it especially vulnerable, Mr. Sobel said, and he thinks there is a risk of programming cuts. “If funding gets cut,” he said, “I think we will see diminished programming that is much less challenging to a traditional museum audience.”