July visitors to the National Museum of American History (NMAH) in 2026 might have expected that the Smithsonian leadership would have special events for America’s 250th. Alas, they didn’t. Nor were there in 2025 to lead into this year. This was no mere oversight, according to “Saving America’s Story,” an extensive 162-page report from the White House’s Domestic Policy Council released on July 4.
Though President Lyndon Johnson’s January 1964 dedication of the museum included the hope that the “iconic artifacts” collected for it “should be used to foster patriotism,” the report concludes that the NMAH under its current Smithsonian leadership “has become subject to 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.”
The new report is in response to Executive Order (EO) 14253, titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” which was signed by President Trump on March 31, 2025. In that EO, President Trump sought “to restore the Smithsonian Institution to its rightful place as a symbol of inspiration and American greatness—igniting the imagination of young minds, honoring the richness of American history and innovation, and instilling pride in the hearts of all Americans.”
To that end, the EO required (among other things) the Vice President and the Director of the Office of Management and Budget to collaborate with Congress on prohibiting future expenditures on Smithsonian exhibits “that degrade shared American values, divide Americans based on race, or promote programs or ideologies inconsistent with Federal law and policy.” With regard to the Smithsonian’s American Women’s History Museum, the EO directed that the museum celebrate the achievements of women and not “transgender women,” i.e., men who claim to be women.
“Saving America’s Story” responds to the call to assess the Smithsonian’s work in bold and distressing detail. It isn’t merely that the museum failed to hold any events on July 4 in 2025 and 2026. Nor even that leadership eliminated “patriotic Star-Spangled Banner flag-folding ceremonies celebrating America’s flag, or any other special programming, to celebrate Flag Day.” No, the most benign part of the Smithsonian treatment is their neglect.
The National Museum of American History has actually eliminated the phrase “American history” from its mission statement. Instead, the NMAH is all about “the complexity of our past” and refocusing on “the entirety of the Americas, not just our part of North America.” The goal in presenting United States history, when they deign to do so, is to “problematize” it. This means presenting our country and its most significant figures as villains.
When it comes to our nation’s beginnings, Columbus is a “murderer,” “slaver,” “killer,” and “thief” who committed genocide according to the NMAH. In the Upending 1620 exhibit, the Pilgrims are treated as colonizers, not “founders,” and we are told that Thanksgiving should be celebrated as “a National Day of Mourning” and an opportunity to “reexamine these stories” and challenge one’s “preconceptions.” The museum’s internal documents show that leadership has pushed the New York Times’s “1619 Project,” which claims that America was founded on slavery and is an inherently racist and evil nation, as our true story.
This is all consistent with the treatment of the 1776 generation. In Pursuit of Life, Liberty, and Happiness, the NMAH’s programming supposedly “celebrating” America’s 250th, ignores the Founders entirely or limits discussion of them to their real and alleged wrongdoings, mostly involving slavery, racism, and sentiments about immigrants. So, too, with the NMAH’s Becoming US “educational” curriculum, which doesn’t have anything about the Founding Fathers (even Washington or Jefferson), the Declaration, or the Constitution.
The rest of the museum’s exhibits and programming all proceed from the false claim that America is a racist nation on “stolen land.”
“To the extent that there is a story told at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History,” the report concludes, “it is not one of ‘the victory of freedom and genius of our country’ but one of regret, tragedy, and shame.” No surprise that the museum wants to tell the story of America as, at best, waves of immigrants continually transforming the country. The museum leadership doesn’t really like this country. In one revealing detail, “Saving America’s Story” recounts how a 2023 DEI report from the museum highlighted a staff member’s belief that things will be better when this nation “exists in hindsight.”
In addition to the above fixations, NMAH has similarly approached all history through the lens of radical transgender ideology. All exhibits operate under the assumptions that “girls can be assigned male at birth,” that “gender identity” is “fluid,” and that the phrase “gender identity disorder” should not be used.
The material in exhibits and supposedly educational materials created or endorsed by NMAH leadership focuses on demonizing white people, valorizing illegal aliens, and promoting transgenderism and abortion. In the name of transgenderism, the museum had sexually explicit drag queen material available to young children. In fact, almost all of the exhibits and programming were geared toward extreme left-wing activism, which NMAH both promoted and occasionally participated in. For instance, the museum collaborated with illegal alien activists to remove a North Carolina sheriff from office.
The Organization of American Historians (OAH), of which NMAH director Anthea Hartig was formerly president, responded to the report in a brief statement that claimed that the NMAH does include things “to celebrate” about America in its collection. Strangely, it doesn’t mention any of them. Nor does it have any response to the accusation of engaging in activism rather than legitimate scholarship.
Instead, the OAH statement includes the usual rhetoric about how “Saving America’s Story” is about “the attempt to turn back the clock to a time when U.S. history was taught as the history of white Christian men who conquered a continent, U.S. military leaders who rarely lost a battle, and U.S. presidents who were single-handedly responsible for national greatness, all under the cover of ‘anti-DEI’ and ‘anti-woke’ crusading.”
The historians assert the independence of the Smithsonian, telling readers that it is not part of the Executive Branch and must be independent and free to do what “historians” think is right.
Historians, however, don’t agree on either the vision or the activism. Here’s to Congress using the power of the purse to rein in this out-of-control anti-American institution that no longer has “American history” as part of its mission.
David P. Deavel teaches at the University of St. Thomas in Houston. A past Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute, he is a Senior Contributor at The Imaginative Conservative. Follow him on X (Twitter) @davidpdeavel.
There must be some way to take out the trash at the Smithsonian.
History it seems is written by those who say, not those who research. Truth and facts no longer play a part, but agenda driven ideology has taken a page from Hollywood, while the gist may contain some actual accounts, accuracy cannot-will not be a priority if it collides with woke thinking or who ever decides. No longer can anyone or anything be trusted to simply record real history and they want it that way. And so another organization that can’t be relied upon, funded by taxpayers so they can be lied to.
The woke mental disease is rotting the Smithsonian. Will this delusional madness ever end?
And no one is surprised. Anything the government has touched in the last 60 years is tainted with lies about our country. Why is there not someone checking the content of this museum? After all, our TAX dollars support this once-great institution. This nation is doomed if it hasn’t learned that the radical liberals have been working to end America’s greatness in every aspect.
This country has been so denigrated by the Democrat party. Barack Obama openly stated we needed to rewrite our history. And the United States of America is no better than any other country in the world. The Democrats goal is to destroy this country from within, and they’re doing a darn good job of it so far. Every great nation and fallen from within. Democrats have also openly stayed at if they can’t run it they will destroy it. They are willing to burn this nation to the ground just so they can rule over the ashes. Truly the party of Satan
stop funding this woke anti American pile of trash
Who owns the institution and is responsible for creating management guidelines and directives? Who controls its mission, objectives and display statements? It is not supposed to be a place for organized graffiti to be produced and presented. Get it under control.
The Smithsonian has just taken on the progressive democrats propaganda that America is a terrible country. White Christian’s started it and they want the colored and the Pride community to be the founding fathers of this country. They are rewriting history. And history cannot be rewritten. Hitler tried it by pushing the white race theory and tried to eliminate the Jews and Gypsy’s, the mentally ill and cripples of this world. Now they are trying to eliminate the white race by blanking them out. Like they never existed. They only forget the freedoms these same white forefathers gave to them in the constitution allows them to rewrite history. This is a concerted effort by the progressive communists in this country, those who hate America with a passion, to destroy her. Wipe her off the face of the earth never to return. Those working at this now will never experience the tyranny they are creating now because they will be dead. There is a cancer in America so deep we cannot cure it. The people who stay silent should speak up. Like during the nineteen thirties in Germany. Nobody paid any attention when they came for a certain group of people and again stayed silent when another group of people were arrested. Till there was nobody left to object when they came for you. We have not learned from history and we are repeating it every day in this country by voting in communists candidates. It’s up to you people to save her. Don’t stay silent. Speak up and vote these candidates out in November. Your life and those of your children and grandchildren depend on it.
I was so disgusted with the Virginia booth at the Fair on the Mall celebrating the 250th anniversary. Nothing about our founding fathers George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Just a childish LOVE sign. Talk about the Socialist Governor and her Minions rewriting history!!
This appears consistent with the objectives of the haters of America who choose to distort US History, which is the objective of the Socialist/Progressives/Communists who are gaining political influence in America.
There are only three branches of U. S. government. The end. Any government agency that claims that it’s independent is treasonous and should be immediately terminated as a Federal agency by Congress or sued out of existence by the American people and the people running that agency permanently removed from government service.
Back in the 1970’s I had a class in geology taught by a man who had worked for the Smithsonian for many years. He was an exceptional teacher. I asked him why he left the Smithsonian, and he said it was becoming too political. They have vast amounts of artifacts they refused to exhibit even way back then, because it didn’t meet their narrative.
Anytime you put a white liberal piece of trash woman in charge of anything. This is what you’re going to get. They are worthless, they celebrate the death of unborn babies, they lie about Islam and how lovely it is. There’s nothing truthful or useful about those people. When I was a kid at 11 years old back in 1970 I went to the Smithsonian and guess what, it had American history. None of what I just read has anything to do with American history.
Democrats are despicable people.
I recommend locking the doors, firing all employees, and starting with a new staff of patriots. This is a crime and maybe we can jail the ones saying treasonous things out loud.
As Joe Friday was alleged to have said [he didn’t]: “Just the facts, ma’am!” We don’t need a bunch of leftists twisting our history into pretzels. Report both the good and bad and you’ll see there’s a lot more GOOD than bad and we are always trying to improve the bad!
This article exposes how bad the leadership in our government has been through Obama and Biden. It seems The Smithsonian has been run by godless people who have no light in them. I am so thankful that the Trump administration is setting things in the right direction. We cannot keep voting in godless leaders. We are a Judeo/Christian nation. Our Founders were not DEIST. Read your Constitution. Without God as the center of all we do in this country, it will fail like the Smithsonian.
Shame on the Smithsonian. Shame. I am stunned by this article. I’ve not lived in Washington for 50 years, but when I was there, I was so proud of the Museums. I was proud of the parks, too, and I am proud of President Trump for restoring them. This tragic mis-direction the Left that has been carried out on our nation must be stopped. It is a degradation of truth and history. It is also a naked attack on the spirit and people of America. It must stop.
We have to rid the country of “ALL” the seditionist, anti-American, communist leaning, globalist CABAL puppets and Woke thinking liberal grundoons one way or another!
I mean every last one in every nook and cranny of America needs to be turfed out and eliminated forever more.
I hear the bright sharp swords of the 3,000,000 to 5,000,000 strong, ready, willing, able bodied and well armed “Citizen Militia” faintly rattling in the distance and it grows louder with each passing day that nothing happens to bring the 500,000+ people guilty of being complicit in sedition, treason, and crimes against humanity to justice! TICK! TOCK1
Given half a chance the progressive/socialist/democrats will recall and edit our nation’s constitution if they can swing it. They want to bring it more in line with that of their mother country, Russia.
Eventually no one with any iota of intelligence will bother to visit our sadly leftist museums.Let the woke crew running these institutions sit there watching their empty galleries gather dust. The government should not fund these places until they actually stop trying to undermine our heritage as one of the greatest and most successful counties ever established.. I will do what I do with all the woke businesses and institutions… I just stop having anything to do with them !!
Last Chance! We should have stood up back in the 60’s. No, instead we became the silent majority. If we do not effect serious change, I fear for my children and grandchildren. Do not be silent. When you see woke, confront it. If dangerous, so be it. I can not think of a better way to meet the creator!
The first step to bringing the Smithsonian to its knees is for congress to DEFUND THEM!!!!!!!!! I am so glad this article came out today because I was getting ready to renew my membership. Now I’m not going to. Nor will I renew my magazine subscription. Too bad for them. When these Marxist pigs leave this country,then they can go to China or the Soviet Union to find out how wonderful life is under these day-dreaming idiots. They will not PRETEND THAT LIFE IS GOOD WHEN SATAN AND THE MINNIONS COME FOR THEM!!!!!!! BY the way when OUR MONEY IS GONE THEY. WILL HAVE TO WORK!!!!!!!!!!! MAGA MAGA MAGA USA USA USA ???????? USA ???????? USA ???????? MAGA MAGA MAGA
As with most alleged “academia” the Smithsonian has been infested with advocates and activists of “America” hate. The 1619 Project “Pulitzer Prize winning” LIE has been accepted as a true account and although proven FALSE has not been removed or lost the Prize. FACT: slavery was initiated IN Africa by Africans enslaving their own and then selling or bartering them to nations all over the world. Reparations ARE DUE but NOT from Americans or other Nations but the true initial enslavers, black Africans. Just as gender fluidity is a false “science”, and its inclusion is just another LIE advocacy. Climate Hysteria is a perversion of the true climate change that not only sustains life but was the reason it came to pass in the first place; without the temperature fluctuations, currents created thereto and the tidal fluxes of the same nature life could not exist or thrive. The BOTTOM LINE is when you indoctrinate the People to one view and close all others you not only deny those people truth and knowledge but the ABILITY to make an informed choice like VOTING, again a Leftist methodology that SEEKS power and control, NOT truth, knowledge and free choice: WHAT the Smithsonian should be celebrating about our country, Founding Fathers and history.
I am deeply disappointed and upset about the Smithsonian turning woke.
Moving from Washington state to SC, one of my goals has long been to visit D.C. and see all the historical landmarks, the free national museums and homes, and most of all, the Smithsonian. It sickens me that the the “powers that be” at the museum want to distort information and radicalize an American iconic hall of history and knowledge. I recognize the importance of not whitewashing the truth, and history needs to be as factual as possible, yet how dare anyone try to take away the pride and dignity of our story.
I will forego the Smithsonian on my visit. At 73 years old, it makes me angry and sad that I will never walk in wonder through what should be one of the most iconic museums in the world. Shame on them for tarnishing that image.
The filthy communist democrat party has infiltrated every aspect of our life. We MUST rid our country of every communist which now include the once democrat political party which has clearly been taken over and destroyed by this evil filth called Marxism.
This is no different than the lack of teaching true history in or schools.
CONGRESS SHOULD GIVE NO FUNDING TO SMITHSONIAN for American history! And they should be relieved of their job!! Close it for a year and get constitutional historians employed. It would not hurt to have some Bible believing employees too.
I guess the Smithsonian never heard of the Pilgrims either! In fact they have hushed up various finds they have confiscated for nearly as long as our country has been a nation. Why would the Smithsonian celebrate our real history when they have been suppressing it for most of it’s own existence?
The misdirected Shaming of America. “the museum had sexually explicit drag queen material available to young children.”
WOKE a very sad JOKE, America! SWAMP creatures have invaded what was once America’s best museum!! Complete Marxist PURGE needed to restore the great story of America begun by patriots. We The People will settle for no less! President Trump EO a good first step!
Shocking to find our great museum system is corrupt. Clearly activist “historians” are real historians. They cannot take history and distort it to a radical agenda. Whatever it takes we deserve a faithful history or just sell off the assets. Our tax dollars are subject to waste, fraud, and now abuse when the people’s institutions are corrupted in this manner.
The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history. -George Orwell
Trump is so correct on this executive order. If the order is not followed they need to pull public funding.
Commies doing what they do; impart lies, division, make themselves look like the best thing since the creation of the Universe! They are PURE EVIL.
How did such anti USA people get in charge of our Smithsonian in the first place? It makes me sad, but it is good to be informed about such a theft of a public institution. . Hooray for Congress stepping up for once.
The Smithsonian is on the taxpayers’ dime. There should not be 1 cent given to support it now. Why would we choose to pay for slanderous, slanted, and yes, even treasonous, posturing representing the anti-American opinions of a small group who run the museums of the Smithsonian? They are not even close to representing the U.S.’s evolution from the Pilgrims through today. One would think they were put in their jobs by adversarial governments!
How in the world did we let “Them” get entrenched in EVERYTHING !?!
Maybe they should research the black men who contributed to winning the Revolutionary War ? Our first double spy was a black man. If the Heritage Foundation can easily find & name them, surely the Smithsonian is capable?? Throughout the history of this nation, people of many races contributed to help the nation grow. As a white child growing up during segregation, I was proud to learn about these amazing people who helped our nation earn the title ” the melting pot of the world” .. many blacks made incredible contributions during the time of slavery – Eli Whitney, Booker T Washington & many others. If they didn’t allow what was happening in their era to stop them, why are we doing it now?? We have stopped working for a great future & have regressed into pettiness- segregating not only by race, but every tiny difference we can find to hate one another.
This is outrageous! Defund the NMAH immediately and completely. Purge DEI and woke/trans ideology. Close the doors until historians with a sense of balance can set a new course. The frontier was not tamed by Pa Ingalls in a skirt.
Shut them down, they are just like some of the school system! The Smithsonian should be charged with treason and depot all parties involved! The Smithsonian is a disgrace to our country! The School district that fail to properly educate our children should be done the same way, stop the domestic assault on our country!
When we decide to put an end to the overt attacks from Sanders and his minions this type of scenario will end. Communists have no place or legal mandate to be members of our government. We are suppose to have a bicameral congress. The republicans must purge their ranks of RINO’s. You do not see DINO’s in the democrat party! Republicans permit politicos that overtly refuse to support the republican mantra to run for election and re-election as, ‘Republicans’. Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, John Thune, Rand Paul and others are not true republicans. Most are never Trumpers and should be primaried out of the party. Let them run as democrats Independents, communists, socialists, libertarians or whatever, but not republicans. Along with McConnell they should all be removed from the republican list of party members. With the proverbial foxes in the hen house Trump’s mandate will not be fulfilled.
My wife and I were members for years. Three or four years ago we started noticing the anti-American trend and dropped or membership. No way in hell would I ever support anything like what they have become.
Pathetic, but really no surprise; the most powerful names are turning against our great country. Why don’t you just pack it up and get the H… Out of our great country
This is disturbing! Who is in charge of designing and promoting the museum? It seems it may be time to do some reevaluation of the management team.
BURN IT DOWN! UNTIL THE TRUTH OF THIS GREAT NATION IS REALIZED!!!
It’s time to bury this Anglo-Saxon hegemony claptrap. If hegemony were all that the cultural leftist elite purport it to be, the minorities in this country would not have advanced to where they are today.
Western civilization, Europe, and America have all done terrible things. What civilization, culture, or country has not?
The sins of Western civilization are no different from those of Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and any other region.
However, the major distinction between Western ideals and traditions is that we confronted our misdeeds. Unlike other cultures, we exposed, acknowledged, and wrote this self-criticism into our documents.
These original sins, as they are often called, in time generated their own solutions.
These Western Anglo-Saxon ideals gave birth to a unique American social idealization of individual liberty, political democracy, equal justice before the law, freedom of worship, human and women’s rights, given to by God, cultural freedom, and the abolition of slavery. These are American Western ideals, not Asian, not African, nor Middle Eastern except by imitation.
It was Western colonialism/imperialism that abolished the Eastern African slave trade, not the Africans.
It appears that the Smithsonian believes that Plurimus is more important than Unum on the Great Seal, “E Plurimus Unum”
Otherwise, why are they promoting a separatist history rather than a unified one?
Maybe they should promote Theodore Roosevelt’s following quote” There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn’t an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag… We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language… and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people.
The next time someone says this is a systemic racist country, answer: in comparison to what country
Just a thought and not al mine!
I once heard the Smithsonian referred to as the nations attic. I can see from what is presented in this article. That the lights have been turned off.
This is what happens when a senile old fart is propped by unelected DEI hires running our country for four years. These people put radical nonsense in every department of every agency, as well as this ‘museum’ and most federal parks. When the person in control of our spent nuclear fuel rods is stealing women’s luggage in airports, transportation and interior secretaries spending four years attacking roads, bridges, towns and mountains they thought were racist instead of actually doing their jobs, it’s no wonder a museum showing their BS is a thing…
I want to say, don’t go to the Simthsonian, but then they win. BUT attend the Smithsonian and ASK questions, make them give answer and challenge them with the truth. It they were to get bombarded daily with the questions and are faced with the TRUTH from of what our history is, several things may happen…they will get frustrated and begin speaking the TRUTH or maybe they will ban the Truth Seekers/Knowers. But if they are not confronted daily and hourly they will have won in their yeyes and they will believe that the people are gullible for the jibberish they dish out. But to ignore the lies and misinformation is detrimental. TRUTH has to presented boldly and often. The Truth needs to be heard.