A new article in * The Atlantic* is reporting that the Trump administration is in the process of developing warning signs to be placed at the entrance to the Smithsonian Museum of American History. You may remember that Trump announced this as part of a 162-page report on the museum released by the White House over the summer.
According to Kelsey Ables:
A person familiar with the plans described some of the preparations to me. Although the Park Service has an idea of the physical structure of the signs, what the signs will actually say and who is writing the text remains a mystery to people in the agency working on them, said the person, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record. The letter from Burgum says that the signs are not finalized, but it offers a preview of what they might look like, describing a number of things ‘visitors should know’ before they enter the museum.
I could go on and on about how absurd this is, but let’s focus on something that will likely be overlooked by the media.
The Trump administration has spent the better part of the past 18 months demonizing the work of the National Park Service. Thousands of employees have been fired or forced into retirement. Like the Smithsonian, the NPS has been forced to conduct a review of all of its interpretive assets with little guidance from above. All of this has been designed to undercut the agency’s reputation and cast the men and women who do this work as unpatriotic and committed to undercutting ‘American Exceptionalism.’
But if this agency shouldn’t be trusted, why is the Trump administration allowing it to take the lead on creating the signs in the first place? The answer of course, practically speaking, is that the ground around the Smithsonian, namely the National Mall, falls under its jurisdiction. That, however, doesn’t change the fact that we are being asked to trust an agency that Trump himself maintains does not have the American public’s interest at heart.
This is where we now are, folks.
It’s just another reminder that Trump’s war on the National Park Service and the Smithsonian has absolutely nothing to do with the historical interpretation or, for that matter, truth itself. It is an attempt to control how history is interpreted and, more broadly, the free exchange of ideas.
