On July 4th, 2026, the Domestic Policy Council, a senior White House advisory body, published a 162-page report detailing the Smithsonian Museum’s rewriting of history to promote DEI ideology and denigrate America’s history and values. According to the report, museum leaders for the National Museum of American History (NMAH) explicitly stated their goal was to “problematize” America’s 250th anniversary.
The report “demonstrates that NMAH fails in the basic task of illuminating our heritage… Museum leadership has explicitly adopted an ideological framework that no longer treats the American story as a shared national inheritance to be taught or celebrated, but as a political instrument to divide, dispirit, and discourage our citizens.”
NMAH’s handling of America’s 250th anniversary showcases the museum’s ideological bias and intent to demean American history. According to the report, NMAH’s America 250 programming titled In Pursuit of Life, Liberty, Happiness “failed to celebrate America’s Founders or Founding,” and left Independence Day “unmarked by any special programming.”
The Domestic Policy Council found that “a visitor to the Museum today will find no major exhibit dedicated to America’s Founding era, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, other Founding Fathers, the Continental Congress, the Pilgrims, the Puritans, or major moments of the American Revolution, such as Washington’s crossing of the Delaware. Instead, visitors will find Founders, such as Benjamin Franklin, introduced chiefly through their connection to slavery while their decisive roles in building the Republic and their anti-slavery efforts are minimized or ignored.”
Additionally, the report found troubling changes to the museum’s mission statement. Leadership has “replaced the phrases ‘infinite richness’ and ‘American history’ with language about empowering people to create ‘a more just and compassionate future’ by exploring ‘the complexity of our past.’ In the words of Director Hartig, this was done in order to ‘get out of the “America First” mentality’ when telling history.”
After extensively investigating and documenting NMAH’s decisions to demean American history, the Domestic Policy Council concluded that the museum “has not met its obligations to the American people.” The museum was founded to educate the public and inspire patriotism but has shifted to being a tool for “social justice” and left-wing activism.
The report concludes: “For purposes of policy formulation under EO 14253, this review of the National Museum of American History concludes that NMAH, by the intention and at the direction of current Museum and Smithsonian leadership, has become subject to institutional capture by a radical, activist ideology that is fundamentally opposed to telling the noble, honest story of the great country we know and love.”
Full report:
