Trump Orders Warning Signs About "Inaccurate Info" Outside Smithsonian Museum

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President Donald Trump ordered signs to be installed outside the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History to warn visitors about “inaccurate information” presented in the museum.

Friday’s executive order is a sharp escalation in Trump’s yearlong effort to overhaul the Smithsonian museums. On July 4, the White House released a 162-page report accusing the history museum’s leadership of “extreme political activism” and erasing America’s history. It decried the institute’s “thinly veiled anti-Americanism,” and directed much of that blame onto museum director Anthea Hartig.

“The Report demonstrates that the Smithsonian leadership does not present American history as a shared national inheritance to be taught and celebrated, but instead views American history as a ‘prime tool’ to advance ideas of social justice and the radical transformation of our society,” Trump wrote in Friday’s order.

He also cited his March 2025 executive order, which triggered a sweeping content review of the Smithsonian’s many museums.

The temporary signs, Trump wrote on Friday, will be installed along the National Park Service-maintained sidewalks and walkways used by the public to access the history museum. They will inform the public of the July 4 report findings, and notify visitors that the museum’s exhibits should be “renovated consistent with [its] findings.” The signage will also direct visitors to “locations and resources for accurate information regarding America’s history,” although the report doesn’t offer specific locations.

The order comes two days after House Republicans grilled Hartig about the museum’s programming, accusing her of capturing America’s story “from a leftist, progressive viewpoint.”

Hartig, in turn, rebuffed the report’s findings, inviting lawmakers to tour the museum.

“I believe what you shall find is not an institution that has forgotten its country,” she said, “but one that loves it enough to tell the full sweep of our history.”