7 times Trump admin. has been accused of erasing black history
5. Trump and the Smithsonian Institution
In March of last year, President Donald Trump issued an executive order that sought to “restore the Smithsonian Institution to its rightful place as a symbol of inspiration and American greatness,” having claimed that the network of museums and libraries was advancing “improper ideology.”
One example cited was an exhibit at the Smithsonian American Art Museum titled “The Shape of Power: Stories of Race and American Sculpture” that claimed “[s]ocieties including the United States have used race to establish and maintain systems of power, privilege, and disenfranchisement” and that “sculpture has been a powerful tool in promoting scientific racism.”
This included barring the Smithsonian from “expenditure on exhibits or programs that degrade shared American values, divide Americans based on race, or promote programs or ideologies inconsistent with Federal law and policy.”
Critics included Khalil Gibran Muhammad, a visiting professor at Harvard’s Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, and a former director of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.
“Trump is interfering with a jewel in our nation’s cultural crown,” wrote Muhammad in an opinion piece for U.S. News and World Report last April.
“American history hasn’t changed in the last nine years, nor has the museum’s commitment to collections and exhibitions based on facts, not ideology. What has changed is that our president is waging a war on history and a war on the truth.”
