The Smithsonian Institution’s leader has responded to US President Donald Trump’s move to perform an extensive review of activities at eight of its museums in a letter to the White House and another to his staff, the latter of which asserts: “Our independence is paramount.” The letters that Smithsonian secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III sent to the White House on 2 September and staff on 3 September were reported by The New York Times and The Washington Post.
“I am assembling a small internal team to advise me and the senior team about what we can provide and on what timeline,” Bunch wrote to staff, referring to the content of the letter he had sent to the White House. “Our own review of content to ensure our programming is nonpartisan and factual is ongoing, and it is consistent with our authority over our programming and content.” He added that he commended Trump on his “admiration and regard for the Smithsonian”.
The letters are the first official responses from the Smithsonian to the White House’s 12 August letter stating that it was initiating a “comprehensive internal review” of exhibitions, collections, educational programming, partnerships, grants, decision-making and more at eight museums under the Smithsonian umbrella: the National Museum of American History, National Museum of Natural History, National Museum of African American History and Culture, National Museum of the American Indian, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian American Art Museum, National Portrait Gallery (NPG) and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. At the time, the Smithsonian had already begun an internal review of its displays to identify and address any instances of bias or partisan messaging.
A week after three assistants to Trump sent that letter to Bunch, the president attacked the Smithsonian in a post on social media, claiming it “is out of control, 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”.
Bunch’s response, which comes a week after he had lunch with Trump and one of the assistants leading the White House review, was approved by a three-member executive committee within the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents. The Smithsonian is not part of the federal government, but it receives around 53% of its $1bn in annual funding via appropriations determined by Congress. The Smithsonian is governed by a 17-member Board of Regents, which includes six members of Congress (three Republicans and three Democrats), Chief Justice of the Supreme Court John Roberts, Vice-President J.D. Vance, and nine leaders in the fields of business, science and culture (including Michael Govan, the chief executive of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art).
The Trump administration has not publicly responded to Bunch’s assertion that the Smithsonian will continue its own internal review rather than acquiesce to a White House review.
The White House’s attempt to review Smithsonian policies and programmes came after an executive order signed by the president in March. That document directed Vance to remove what it described as the Smithsonian’s “divisive, race-centred ideology” and deny funding to any exhibitions or art that “degrade shared American values”.
In response to that executive order, Bunch wrote an internal memo to Smithsonian staff that read, in part: “As always, our work will be shaped by the best scholarship, free of partisanship, to help the American public better understand our nation’s history, challenges and triumphs.”
Subsequently, Trump targeted the director of the NPG, Kim Sajet, and attempted to fire her in May. She resigned two weeks later; earlier this week, Sajet was named as the new director of the Milwaukee Art Museum.
Amid the White House’s scrutiny of the Smithsonian, the artist Amy Sherald cancelled a leg of her traveling survey exhibition American Sublime at the NPG, claiming gallery representatives had pressured her to remove the painting Trans Forming Liberty (2024), which depicts a non-binary transgender person posing as the Statue of Liberty, allegedly out of fear that it could provoke Trump. Earlier this week, it was revealed that American Sublime will travel to the Baltimore Museum of Art instead (2 November-5 April 2026).
