Earlier this year, the administration signed an executive order accusing the Smithsonian Institution of operating under a “divisive, race-centered ideology” and directing it to eliminate exhibits that “degrade shared American values.” Since then the pressure has escalated: the White House is demanding extensive internal records from the Institution and requiring a review of exhibit content at eight of its museums, including the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the National Museum of the American Indian, ahead of the country’s 250th-anniversary celebrations. Officials have told the Smithsonian that congressionally authorized funding could be withheld if leadership won’t guarantee the history on display is told “in a positive light.”
The Smithsonian has responded by handing over more of its exhibition plans. That is what leverage built on funding does — it doesn’t need to censor a single label directly when it can make an institution’s continued existence depend on doing the censoring itself. A museum that answers to Congress for its budget was never fully independent of politics. What’s being tested now is how much of that independence survives being asked to prove its loyalty in writing.