White House report accuses Smithsonian history museum of ‘ideological capture’

The White House released a 162-page report July 4 accusing the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History of ideological capture, saying the taxpayer-funded museum has abandoned its founding purpose of fostering national pride and historical understanding in favor of “extreme political activism.” 

The report, titled “Saving America’s Story: How Ideological Capture at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History Erases Our Heritage,” comes as part of President Donald Trump’s March 2025 executive order directing a review of federally funded cultural institutions, including the Smithsonian, which receives more than $1 billion a year from taxpayers. 

“As this report shows, the Museum purposely presents America as a problematic country irredeemably conceived, founded by deeply flawed men, and still operating today as an instrument of systemic racism and oppression,” the executive summary stated. 

The museum now presents history, the summary continued, as “defined by white supremacy, slavery, conquest, exclusion, hierarchy, racism, xenophobia, misogyny, and systemic injustice,” and traditional patriotic narratives and national symbols are treated as objects to be questioned, dismantled, and reinterpreted.

According to the report, the museum’s interpretive plan directs staff to connect exhibits, “whatever the topic,” to seven “core issues of our time”: race and identity, gender and sexuality, climate change, immigration and migration, economic inequality, technological change, and nationalism and globalism.

At the same time, the museum lacks a major exhibit dedicated to the Founding era, the Continental Congress, or key moments of the American Revolution, according to the report. It said the founders are often introduced primarily through their ties to slavery while their role in creating the Republic is minimized.

The report also criticized the museum’s director, Anthea Hartig, who has led the museum since 2019 and previously described history as a “prime tool of social justice.” According to the report, she also suggested in a presentation that people must “get out of the ‘America First’ mentality.”

The report further accused the museum and its leadership of promoting pro-abortion messaging, anti-gun activism, illegal immigration, gender ideology, sexually explicit material, and claims that the U.S. rests on “stolen land.”

Mike Gonzalez, the Angeles T. Arredondo E Pluribus Unum senior fellow at The Heritage Foundation, said in a July 6 statement that the report showed the need for leadership changes at the Smithsonian and called on Congress to act.

“The timely report makes clear why we have Marxist politicians like Zohran Mamdani, Pramila Jayapal, and Katie Wilson,” Gonzalez also said. “They and their voters have been taught by institutions such as the Smithsonian to despise America’s history and heritage.”

A Smithsonian spokesperson told the New York Post that its museums are non-partisan and rejected the report’s complaints. 

“For more than 180 years, the Smithsonian has served the American public with nonpartisan and independent scholarship,” the spokesperson said, “and we remain committed to doing so.”