The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery removed wall text that referred to US president Donald Trump’s two impeachments – language that had upset the White House – when the museum recently replaced a portrait of him in its “America’s Presidents” exhibition.
The wall text described some of Trump’s political accomplishments, including his appointment of three supreme court justices, his promotion of the development of Covid-19 vaccines and his “historic comeback in the 2024 election” after he lost the previous election to Joe Biden.
It also included: “Impeached twice, on charges of abuse of power and incitement of insurrection after supporters attacked the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, he was acquitted by the Senate in both trials.”
That sentence had long bothered the Trump administration.
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After Mr Trump announced last year that he was firing Kim Sajet, who was then the National Portrait Gallery’s director, the White House compiled a list of grievances about her, outlining what it called evidence of partisanship and bias. Among these points was the sentence about the impeachments that has now been taken down.
The new image, a black-and-white portrait taken by White House photographer Daniel Torok, shows the president in the Oval Office, staring directly into the camera with his fists on the resolute desk.
When Mr Trump posted the image on social media in October, he wrote, “In the Oval Office, getting ready to leave our imprint on the World. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
In a statement over the weekend, Davis Ingle, a White House spokesperson, said that it was an “iconic photo” of the president and that “his unmatched aura will be seen and felt throughout the halls of the National Portrait Gallery.”
The National Portrait Gallery said in a statement that it had hung a new photograph of Mr Trump on Thursday and was beginning a planned update of the “America’s Presidents” exhibition.
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“For some new exhibitions and displays, the museum has been exploring quotes or tombstone labels, which provide only general information, such as the artist’s name,” the statement said. “The history of presidential impeachments continues to be represented in our museums.”
The new wall text simply identifies Mr Trump as the 45th and 47th president, saying he was born in 1946. According to the National Portrait Gallery’s website, the wall text accompanying former president Bill Clinton’s official portrait notes he was impeached for “lying while under oath about a sexual relationship he had with a White House intern”.
For the past year, the Smithsonian Institution has been under pressure from the Trump administration to present a primarily positive view of America. In March, Mr Trump issued an executive order, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History”, that instructed officials to scrutinise the museum complex for “improper ideology”.
The Smithsonian, which has long been regarded as independent from the executive branch, has produced only part of a lengthy list of documents the White House has requested as it carries out a review of its current and planned exhibitions. It now faces a new ultimatum to hand over all of the requested materials by Tuesday or risk potential cuts to its $1 billion budget, which is largely dependent on federal funds.
The White House’s interest in the National Portrait Gallery was fuelled in part by Ms Sajet’s refusal to exhibit a triumphant portrait of Mr Trump – it showed the president next to a rising sun with a bald eagle – during his first inauguration.
The Smithsonian did not follow through on Mr Trump’s announcement that he was firing Ms Sajet, publicly insisting it held the reins on personnel matters. But she resigned on her own, saying the decision was in the best interests of the institution. (The museum’s acting director is Elliot Gruber.)
The recent changes at the National Portrait Gallery were earlier reported by The Washington Post. The museum typically rotates photographs of the president until unveiling an official painting once the person has left office. The latest portrait replaced a colour photograph by the Washington Post’s Matt McClain that showed Trump wearing a red tie against a black background.
Last year, another Smithsonian museum, the National Museum of American History, changed the language describing Mr Trump’s impeachments in an exhibition about the American presidency.
In a description of Mr Trump’s second impeachment that says he was charged with “incitement of insurrection”, the Smithsonian removed two phrases: one describing “repeated ‘false statements’ challenging the 2020 election results” and another about a speech by the president that it said “encouraged – and foreseeably resulted in – imminent lawless action at the Capitol”.
The history museum also added the word “alleged” to a description of Trump’s first impeachment: “The charges focused on the president’s alleged solicitation of foreign interference in the 2020 presidential election and defiance of Congressional subpoenas”.
The Smithsonian said then that it had “a steadfast commitment to scholarship, rigorous research and the accurate, factual presentation of history”. The exhibition on the American presidency includes information about the impeachments of former presidents Andrew Johnson and Mr Clinton.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
