U.S. President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that his administration will review the Smithsonian Institution’s museums and suggested that he wants to paint American history in a more favourable light.
“The Smithsonian is OUT OF CONTROL, where everything discussed is how horrible our Country is, how bad Slavery was, and how unaccomplished the downtrodden have been — Nothing about Success, nothing about Brightness, nothing about the Future,” he wrote on Truth Social.
“We are not going to allow this to happen,” he continued, “and I have instructed my attorneys to go through the Museums, and start the exact same process that has been done with Colleges and Universities where tremendous progress has been made. This Country cannot be WOKE, because WOKE IS BROKE. We have the ‘HOTTEST’ Country in the World, and we want people to talk about it, including in our Museums.”
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The announcement comes months after the president outlined his administration’s plans to overhaul the museum complex, and weeks after it agreed to revise an exhibit that mentioned Trump’s two impeachments.
Earlier this month, Smithsonian spokesperson Phillip Zimmerman told the Associated Press that the section in question, which also includes information about the impeachment of former U.S. president Bill Clinton and the Watergate scandal, needed to be refurbished. He said the decision came after the museum was “reviewing” its legacy content.
“Because the other topics in this section had not been updated since 2008, the decision was made to restore the Impeachment case back to its 2008 appearance,” Zimmerman said in an email to the outlet.
In an executive order signed in March, Trump vowed to “restore the Smithsonian Institution to its rightful place as a symbol of inspiration and American greatness.”
The Smithsonian, according to its website, is the world’s largest museum complex with 21 museums and a national zoo.
Trump says it was once “widely respected as a symbol of American excellence and a global icon of cultural achievement,” but has fallen victim to “divisive, race-centred ideology.”
According to ABC News, the White House wrote in a letter to Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution Lonnie Bunch that it wants the organization to “reflect the unity, progress, and enduring values that define the American story.”
The Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History is seen from the Washington Monument on June 19, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Kevin Carter / Getty Images
The outlet also noted that the president had been complimentary of its work in the past.
During a visit to the National Museum of African American History and Culture in 2017, Trump commended its exhibits, saying they were “incredible,” “done with love,” and that it was a “truly great museum.”
He said his tour was “a meaningful reminder of why we have to fight bigotry, intolerance and hatred in all of its very ugly forms,” ABC News added.
In April, Democrats on the House Administration Committee wrote in a letter to Vice-President JD Vance that Trump’s executive order was a “flagrant attempt to erase Black history.”
“The attempt to paper over elements of American history is both cowardly and unpatriotic,” the letter said, as reported by NBC News.