Trump Administration Accuses Smithsonian Museum of “Radical” Bias; Institution Rejects the Claim

The Trump administration's latest broadside against the Smithsonian reads as another chapter in its campaign to reshape how the country tells its own history,  this time targeting the National Museum of American History. A 162-page report from the White House Domestic Policy Council, titled "Saving America's Story: How Ideological Capture at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History Erases Our Heritage," accuses the museum of "institutional capture by a radical, activist ideology that is fundamentally opposed to telling the noble, honest story of the great country we know and love."

Among its complaints: that the museum underemphasized the Founding Fathers and colonial history, wasn't celebratory enough of the nation's 250th anniversary, and engaged in "anti-white," "illegal alien" and transgender "activism." It further accuses the museum of trying to "indoctrinate" teachers and students, and singles out director Anthea Hartig,  a past president of the Organization of American Historians,  as "an activist advancing an ideological agenda contradictory to the museum's founding purpose of fostering patriotism."

Smithsonian secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III pushed back in a staff memo, calling the report "not a fair characterization of the work and totality of the National Museum of American History," and affirming the institution's "uncompromising commitment to tell the fullness of America's story." He reiterated its "steadfast commitment to scholarship, nonpartisanship, independence, accuracy and integrity."

The report follows Trump's March 2025 executive order targeting "improper ideology" at the Smithsonian and an August 2025 demand for a "comprehensive internal review" of eight museums,  part of a pattern opponents say amounts to pressure to scrub uncomfortable chapters of racial and social history, from slavery to civil rights, even though the Smithsonian's charter designates it as independent of the federal government. Bunch, discussing the institution's 250th-anniversary exhibit on Meet the Press, framed the mission differently: "America is much an ideal as it is a place... let us honor the words of Thomas Jefferson and the founders, but let us use those to challenge us to be better."

Not everyone reads the report this way,  the administration frames it as correcting ideological bias and restoring a "noble, honest" account of the founding, not erasing history but rebalancing a narrative it sees as overly critical.

Link: NPR