Washington’s Smithsonian is a sprawling chain of museums dedicated to both celebrating and scrutinizing the American story — and the latest cultural institution targeted by President Donald Trump’s bid to quash diversity efforts.His recent executive order to excavate “divisive ideology” from the famed visitor attraction and research complex follows a wave of efforts to keep culture and history defined on his terms, including his takeover of the national capital’s prestigious performing arts venue, the Kennedy Center.And it’s got critics up in arms.”It’s a declaration of war,” said David Blight of Yale University, who leads the Organization of American Historians.”It is arrogant and appalling for them to claim they have the power and the right to say what history actually is and how it should be exhibited, written, and taught,” Blight told AFP.Trump’s latest order also says monuments to the historic Confederate rebellion, many of which were removed in recent years in the wake of anti-racism protests, might soon be restored.His order even mentioned the National Zoo — which is operated by the Smithsonian and recently welcomed two pandas from China — as potentially needing a cleanse from “improper, divisive, or anti-American ideology.” And Trump says a number of Smithsonian museums, including the distinguished National Museum of African American History and Culture, espouse “corrosive ideology,” and are trying to rewrite American history in relation to issues of race and gender.Critical observers say the exact opposite is true.Margaret Huang — president of the nonprofit Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate — called Trump’s order “the latest attempt to erase our history” and “a blatant attempt to mask racism and white supremacy as patriotism.””Black history is US history. Women’s history is US history. This country’s history is ugly and beautiful,” Huang said.For critics like Huang and Blight, Trump’s push to tell a rose-tinted history of “American greatness” is a disservice to museum-goers in a complicated country built on values including freedom of speech — but whose history is rife with war, slavery and civil rights struggles.”What’s at stake is the way the United States officially portrays its own past, to itself, and to the world,” Blight said.- ‘Stories about ourselves’ -Trump is a 78-year-old Frank Sinatra fan with a penchant for Broadway — he’s spoken particularly fondly of the 1980s-era musical “Cats,” the fantastical tale of a dancing tribe of felines.But his brand of culture war is much bigger than personal taste: in his second term, the president appears intent on rooting out what he deems too “woke.”The executive crusade is part of a broader effort to strip American society of efforts to promote diversity, equity and inclusion that institutions nationwide have vied to incorporate in recent years, purging culture of anti-racism and LGBTQ+ support.Critics say Trump’s extension of his grip to the Smithsonian represents an eyebrow-raising incursion into the programming independence of the more than 175-year-old institution.Founded in the mid-19th century, the Smithsonian “has transformed along with our culture and our society,” said Robert McCoy, a history professor at Washington State University.The complex — including the zoo, 21 museums and 14 education and research centers — is approximately two-thirds federally funded, with the rest of its approximately billion-dollar-budget stemming from sources including endowments, memberships and donations.Its Board of Regents includes the vice president. But, similarly to the Kennedy Center, until now it operated largely above political lines, especially when it came to programming.- ‘Meaning and belonging’ -“It’s become more diverse. The stories it tells are more complicated. These are people who are attempting to help us broaden what it means to be an American — what it means to tell us stories about ourselves that are more accurate and include more people,” McCoy told AFP.”When you lose that, you begin to marginalize a lot of different groups.”McCoy fears the White House’s bid to clamp down on the Smithsonian’s work could prompt resignations, a concern Blight echoed: “If they stay in their jobs, they’re in effect working for an authoritarian takeover of what they do. That will not be acceptable.”Trump’s attempts at cultural dominance in federal institutions are part of a broader package of control, McCoy said, a pattern that echoes research on how authoritarian regimes seize power.”It’s not just political and economic institutions,” he said. “It’s also the institutions that provide people with a sense of meaning and belonging — that they’re American.”

US government lawyers pushed Friday for the case of a pro-Palestinian protest leader slated for deportation to be moved to a Louisiana court thought to be sympathetic to President Donald Trump’s hardline immigration crackdown.Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil — a prominent face of the protest movement that erupted in response to Israel’s war in Gaza — was arrested and taken to Louisiana earlier this month, sparking protests. Several other foreign student protesters have been similarly targeted.Also Friday, Columbia University’s interim president stepped down, one week after the Ivy League school announced a package of measures to placate Trump and his criticisms over student protests and alleged campus anti-Semitism. He has targeted the school with hundreds of millions in funding cuts. Katrina Armstrong will be replaced by Board of Trustees co-chair Claire Shipman, who will serve until a permanent replacement is hired, Columbia said in a statement.”Dr Armstrong accepted the role of interim president at a time of great uncertainty for the University and worked tirelessly to promote the interests of our community,” Board of Trustees chair David Greenwald said.Shipman noted her “clear understanding of the serious challenges before us.”The government has not accused Khalil of any crime, but instead ordered his deportation and canceled his resident’s permit, alleging he was undermining US foreign policy.At a hearing in New Jersey, government lawyer August Flentje said that “for jurisdictional certainty, the case belongs in Louisiana.”But Khalil’s lawyer Baher Azmy accused the government of seeking to move the case to bolster its “retaliation.”The judge said he would not rule immediately on shifting the case to the Western District of Louisiana, a more conservative bench that has previously leaned towards Trump’s policies.Khalil was not present at the hearing, but his wife Noor attended with several supporters.- ‘Witch hunt’? -Khalil’s arrest has outraged Trump opponents, free speech advocates and some on the political right, who say the case will have a chilling effect on freedom of expression.Immigration officers have similarly detained and sought to deport a Tufts University student from Turkey, Rumeysa Ozturk, and Columbia student Yunseo Chung, a US permanent resident originally from South Korea.Like Khalil, Ozturk has been detained in Louisiana despite her initial arrest in the northeastern state of Massachusetts.Ozturk’s lawyer said Thursday that “we should all be horrified at the way (officers) abducted Rumeysa in broad daylight” after footage of masked, plainclothes officers surrounding the veiled student circulated online.A federal judge in Massachusetts on Friday issued a court order saying “Ozturk shall not be removed from the United States until further Order of this Court,” while the jurisdiction of her case is reviewed.Students at Columbia have described a culture of fear in the wake of the action against the college and its students.- ‘Retaliation’ -“Nothing can protect you,” said a Hispanic-American student who participated in last year’s protests calling for a Gaza ceasefire and for Columbia to divest from Israel.”I take precautions, I check if someone is following me. Before, I wasn’t afraid to leave my apartment door unlocked; now I lock it in case an agent comes in to check my stuff.”Nadia Urbinati, a professor of political theory at Columbia, told AFP that “writing papers, teaching, having new research, researchers or fellows becomes more restricted, controlled and monitored.”A foreign student, who declined to be named for fear of retaliation, said Trump had sought to “isolate” activists. “We try to laugh,” said another, but “the feeling of fear and paranoia is widespread.”Dozens protested in support of Khalil outside the New Jersey courthouse, holding Palestinian flags and banners.As well as targeting foreign students at Columbia University, the Trump administration has sought to slash $400 million of federal funding and grants over alleged anti-Semitism on campus.Last week the university announced a package of measures to placate Trump, including “improvements to our disciplinary processes.” Columbia said it would require protesters to identify themselves when challenged, even if they wear masks, as many did during the height of the pro-Palestinian protests.It also announced the expansion of its security team, including hiring 36 officers empowered to remove or arrest those that break university rules.The Trump administration had demanded that the university deploy external oversight, but the school stopped short of that, instead vowing to engage with outside academics on the issue.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences apologized Friday for failing to defend an Oscar-winning Palestinian filmmaker who said he was attacked by Israeli settlers.The group, which hosts and awards the Oscars each year, wrote to members after movie stars including Joaquin Phoenix, Penelope Cruz and Richard Gere had slammed its initially muted response to the incident.The Academy “condemns violence of this kind anywhere in the world” and its leaders “abhor the suppression of free speech under any circumstances,” said the letter, seen by AFP.Hamdan Ballal co-directed “No Other Land,” which won best documentary at this year’s Academy Awards. This week, he said he had been assaulted by settlers and detained at gunpoint by soldiers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.Unlike multiple other prominent filmmaker groups, the US-based Academy initially did not issue a statement. On Wednesday, it sent a letter to members that condemned “harming or suppressing artists for their work or their viewpoints,” without naming Ballal.By Friday morning, more than 600 Academy members had signed their own statement in response. “It is indefensible for an organization to recognize a film with an award in the first week of March, and then fail to defend its filmmakers just a few weeks later,” the members said.”We stand in condemnation of the brutal assault and unlawful detention of Oscar-winning Palestinian filmmaker Hamdan Ballal by settlers and Israeli forces in the West Bank,” they wrote.The Academy leadership’s response “fell far short of the sentiments this moment calls for,” said the members.The Los Angeles-based group’s board convened an extraordinary meeting Friday to confront the deepening crisis, according to trade outlet Deadline.Later Friday, it issued an apology to Ballal “and all artists who felt unsupported by our previous statement.””We regret that we failed to directly acknowledge Mr Ballal and the film by name,” it wrote.”No Other Land” chronicles the forced displacement of Palestinians by Israeli troops and settlers in Masafer Yatta — an area Israel declared a restricted military zone in the 1980s.Despite winning the coveted Oscar, the film has struggled to find a major US distributor.Following Monday’s incident, Ballal told AFP the “brutality” of the attack “made me feel it was because I won the Oscar.”During his detention at an Israeli military center, Ballal said he noticed soldiers mentioning his name alongside the word “Oscar” during shift changes.He was released Tuesday, after being detained the previous day for allegedly “hurling rocks.” Yuval Abraham, who also co-directed and appears in the documentary, has spoken out against the Academy’s response.”After our criticism, the academy’s leaders sent out this email to members explaining their silence on Hamdan’s assault: they need to respect ‘unique viewpoints’,” he wrote on X, sharing a screenshot of the Academy’s letter.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will investigate diversity efforts at the Walt Disney Company, the head of the US agency said on Friday.Disney and its subsidiary ABC are being targeted as part of the Trump administration’s efforts to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs at government agencies and private companies, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said in a letter to the entertainment giant.US President Donald Trump picked Carr to head the FCC.”I am concerned that ABC and its parent company have been and may still be promoting invidious forms of DEI in a manner that does not comply with FCC regulations,” Carr wrote in the letter, a copy of which he shared on X, formerly Twitter.Disney made a priority of promoting race and gender diversity across its operations in recent years, and “apparently did so in a manner that infected many aspects of your company’s decisions,” Carr wrote in a letter addressed to chief executive Robert Iger.Carr notified Comcast and NBCUniversal in February that they were targets of an investigation into their diversity and equality efforts, thanking Trump at the time for efforts to “root out the scourge of DEI.”Trump’s assault on diversity across the United States government is dismantling decades of racial justice programs.Delivering on a campaign promise, the Republican billionaire made it one of his first acts in office to terminate all federal government DEI programs, which he said led to “illegal and immoral discrimination.”Earlier this month, Civil War historian Kevin M. Levin reported that Arlington National Cemetery had begun to wipe its website of the histories of Black, Hispanic and women war veterans. Descendants of the Native Americans who played a vital role for US forces in World War II said they had been shocked to discover their ancestors’ heroic contributions had been effectively deleted from the public record.The president’s move to end DEI programs has also affected more than just the federal government.Since Trump won last year’s election, several major US corporations — including Google, Meta, Amazon and McDonalds — have either entirely scrapped or dramatically scaled back their DEI programs. The American Civil Liberties Union says Trump’s policies have taken a “‘shock and awe’ approach that upends longstanding, bipartisan federal policy meant to open doors that had been unfairly closed.”US federal anti-discrimination programs were born of the 1960s civil rights struggle, mainly led by Black Americans, to promote equality and justice after hundreds of years of slavery. After the United States abolished slavery in 1865, the country continued to see other institutional forms of racism enforced.Today, Black Americans and other minorities continue to disproportionately face police violence, incarceration, poverty, homelessness and hate crimes, according to official data.