“History is incredibly challenging,” the director of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History testified in the House, rebutting the Republican-led effort to reshape what the nation’s government-sponsored museums say about America.
For two hours Tuesday, Anthea Hartig faced a hostile panel of Republican lawmakers who cast the Smithsonian Institution as an “ideological” political organization and aired what they saw as perceived slights against the founding fathers, cultural icons and conservative ideas contained in the museum’s galleries.
Hartig pushed back, saying the museum “tries to reflect the richness of our history” without advancing any political agenda.