Japanese American museum blasts Trump order as threat to ‘truth and democracy’
The order directs US park sites to flag content that may ‘disparage Americans, past or present’
Visitors at the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles stand beside flags representing World War II incarceration camps on February 17, 2024, during a commemoration of Executive Order 9066 – the 1942 directive that authorised the forced relocation of Japanese Americans. Some participants had been detained at the camps or had family members who were. Photo: TNS
A prominent museum preserving the legacy of Japanese American incarceration during World War II has condemned US President Donald Trump’s new directive requiring national park sites to flag content deemed critical of the country’s history, calling it a dangerous attempt to whitewash past injustices and dismantle democratic values.
The Japanese American National Museum (JANM) said the policy – which it traced to a May executive order titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History” – would suppress uncomfortable truths and erase the legacy of marginalised communities, including the more than 10,000 Japanese Americans imprisoned during World War II at sites such as Manzanar and Minidoka.
“JANM is deeply disturbed by this new directive, especially at historical sites like Manzanar and Minidoka where Japanese Americans were unjustly incarcerated during World War II,” said Ann Burroughs, the museum’s president and CEO, in a statement posted to social media on Thursday.
“The widespread dismantling of federal agencies that support our work and the attempts at the wholesale erasure of history will not help us achieve a more just America.”
Burroughs warned the initiative formed part of a broader campaign to “suppress historical narratives that challenge [the administration’s] preferred version of events” and to “erase the contributions of people of colour, women, LGBTQIA+ individuals, and other marginalised communities from the American story”.
New instructions circulated by the US Department of the Interior in May and the National Park Service in June direct park officials to identify exhibits and educational materials that may “disparage Americans, past or present” or fail to highlight the nation’s “beauty, abundance, or grandeur”.
As a result, signs have been installed at the Manzanar National Historic Site – where more than 10,000 Japanese Americans were detained during the war – encouraging visitors to report any potentially critical narratives.
Similar signage has reportedly appeared at other federal historic sites, including locations specifically established to commemorate state-sanctioned injustice.
According to a Manzanar official quoted by San Francisco-based outlet SFGATE, the new mandate now applies across the entire US national park system.
Dennis Arguelles, Southern California director of the National Parks Conservation Association, said the move risked silencing efforts to confront the nation’s past honestly.
“We’re just starting to unearth some of these important histories, and now we’re being faced with the attempt to erase them,” he told SFGATE.
JANM, which maintains one of the world’s largest archives of artefacts related to the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans, reaffirmed its mission to preserve full and truthful accounts of history – regardless of political pressure.
“As JANM has said before, history does not yield to censorship or political ideologies,” Burroughs said. “It demands honest, transparent conversations and a commitment to having an evolving understanding of how the past shapes the present and the future.”
She added: “JANM will continue to embody our mission, ensure that history is told fully and truthfully, and carry the lessons of history forward.”
The museum itself has already felt the impact of shifting federal priorities. Under the Trump administration, JANM lost about US$1.7 million in federal support following cuts to grants from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).
Les Ouchida holds a 1943 photo of himself and his siblings taken at a World War II internment camp, at an exhibit on Japanese American incarceration in Sacramento, California. Photo: AP
Among the cancelled grants was a US$175,000 NEH award that had funded its “Landmarks of American History and Culture” teacher workshops, which reached over 100 educators from 31 states and benefited some 21,000 students. An additional US$5 million in pending grant applications has also been put at risk, threatening future preservation and education initiatives.
The IMLS, meanwhile, was targeted for downsizing under a wider executive order-driven effort to dismantle federal agencies supporting diversity and cultural programming, leaving institutions like JANM scrambling to secure alternative funding.
While public donations have since helped stabilise its finances, JANM’s galleries remain closed for major renovations until late 2026.
Trump, in his March executive order underpinning the new policy, accused critics of portraying the United States’ “unparalleled legacy of advancing liberty, individual rights, and human happiness” as “inherently racist, sexist, oppressive, or otherwise irredeemably flawed”.
Federal agencies are now required to issue warning notices for exhibitions, films, or other content deemed to criticise US history.
