WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump announced his plan to transform the Smithsonian Institution through an executive order on Thursday, focusing funding on programs that do not promote “divisive narratives” or “improper ideology.”
Trump asserted that there has been a “concerted and widespread” initiative over the last ten years to alter American history by substituting “objective facts” with a “distorted narrative driven by ideology instead of truth.”
He signed an executive order appointing Vice President JD Vance to lead the mission to “eliminate improper ideology” from the Smithsonian Institution, which includes its museums, educational and research facilities, as well as the National Zoo.
Specific mention was made in Trump’s order of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, along with the Women’s History Museum, which is still under development.
“Museums in our Nation’s capital should serve as spaces for learning — not as venues for ideological indoctrination or divisive narratives that misrepresent our shared history,” the order stated.
Representatives of the Smithsonian did not immediately reply to an emailed inquiry for comment.
The Smithsonian Institution is the largest museum, education, and research complex in the world. It comprises 21 museums and the National Zoo, with eleven of the museums situated along the National Mall in Washington.
The institution was founded with funds from James Smithson, a British scientist who left his estate to the United States to establish “at Washington, under the name of the Smithsonian Institution, an establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge.”
