The White House Domestic Policy Council released a White House Smithsonian history report late on Independence Day, accusing Smithsonian leadership — especially at the National Museum of American History — of ideological capture and extreme political activism. The report said the Smithsonian Institution and the National Museum of American History cannot be trusted to tell America’s story honestly.
White House Domestic Policy Council report
The report said the Smithsonian should tell America’s story in a way that is inspiring, unifying, and worthy of the republic. It also said the museum’s mission has moved away from straightforward historical education and scholarship. That shift is the report’s core charge, because it ties the criticism to how the institution presents history, not just to who leads it.
President Donald Trump said in March 2026 that he intended to force changes at the Smithsonian Institution with an executive order. His order targeted funding for programs that advanced divisive narratives and improper ideology. The report released late on Independence Day fits that timeline and gives a written case for the changes Trump said he wanted.
Lonnie Bunch on Meet the Press
Lonnie Bunch, the Smithsonian secretary and the first African American to lead the Smithsonian Institution, offered a different standard for the work. On NBC’s Meet the Press, he said “the notion of being a more perfect union, not the perfect union, is really what motivates me.” He also said “I think what I want people to understand is that there is a responsibility to continue to make those aspirations available, accessible, meaningful to a whole range of people,” and that America’s greatest strength is “it’s not running away from its history, but it’s understanding how that history.”
That puts the White House report and Bunch on opposite sides of the same question: whether the Smithsonian should be reshaped around a narrower political critique or continue presenting history as a shared public responsibility. Anthea Hartig was among those linked to the museum side of the story through the facts provided, but the report itself focused on leadership and interpretive ideology rather than a personnel action.
Whether the White House will replace Smithsonian leadership or turn the report into a specific change in policy is not answered in the material released so far. For now, the document gives Trump a public rationale for pressure on the Smithsonian Institution, while Bunch is arguing for a museum mission grounded in access, meaning, and historical understanding.
