A few minutes’ ‌walk from Philadelphia’s Independence Hall, where the nation’s founding ideals were debated and declared, another part of the American story has become a flashpoint. At the President’s House, an early residence used by presidents George Washington and John Adams, an outdoor exhibit examines what the National Park Service describes as “the paradox between slavery and freedom”. It centres on the lives of enslaved people, including Oney ‌Judge, a woman enslaved by George and Martha Washington, who escaped in 1796 and remained free despite efforts to recapture her. In January, the National Park Service removed slavery-related panels from the site after US president Donald Trump issued an executive order last year directing federal agencies and cultural institutions to review and revise programmes it says promote “divisive ideology”. Administration officials say the changes restore ​balance to institutions they say focused too heavily on America’s injustices while critics say they narrow discussion of slavery and race. Tourists inspect a display entitled The Dirty Business of Slavery at the President's House in Philadelphia in 2025. Photograph: Matthew Hatcher/Getty Images In January, slavery-related panels were removed from the President's House site in Philadelphia following an executive order by Donald Trump. Photograph: Matthew Hatcher/Getty Images The Philadelphia move triggered a legal battle and a federal judge ordered the panels’ restoration in February. Then, a federal appeals court ruled last month that the Trump administration could remove and replace the exhibit. Alan Spears, senior director of cultural resources at the non-profit National Parks Conservation Association, said the controversy’s implications extend beyond Philadelphia, raising questions about whether historic sites can offer uncensored interpretations. “When you take down those panels, you are sanitising, softening, whitewashing and erasing American history,” Spears said.As the United States marks its 250th anniversary, the debate over historical inclusion has become part of a larger national argument over how ​the country should tell its story: as a celebration of founding ideals and national achievement or a more nuanced reflection that includes slavery, Indigenous dispossession, immigration, exclusion and the struggles of marginalised groups to secure the rights promised in the nation’s founding documents.Museums, historic sites, parks and cultural institutions across the country have spent years preparing events intended to draw millions of visitors during the ⁠semiquincentennial. But those plans have become entangled in a broader fight over historical memory, patriotism and political power.In Florida, the Stonewall National Museum, Archives and Library, one of the nation’s leading LGBTQ+ archives, is facing pressure of its own. The museum’s president Robert Kesten said ‌funding ‌losses ​could limit efforts to preserve and share historical records as corporate and private donors become more cautious about supporting organisations they view as politically controversial. The museum expects to lose between $70,000 and $90,000 in county grant funding by the end of the year. Kesten attributed the cuts to Florida Republican officials he said have opposed LGBTQ+ inclusion.“That’s a hell of a lot of money for an organisation like ours to make up,” he said.The museum’s current exhibit features ⁠Baron Friedrich von Steuben, the Prussian military officer who helped transform George Washington’s Continental Army during the Revolutionary War. Historians have debated ​his sexuality, but some scholars and LGBTQ+ advocates cite him as a possible prominent gay figure in the nation’s founding. Kesten said that US ​history has disproportionately skewed toward the stories of white, Christian and heterosexual men. “And if you are anything else, you are expendable.”Historians, museum leaders and cultural advocates told Reuters the federal push risks narrowing the range of stories that museums and historic sites are able to tell. The fight is unfolding even as ‌museums offering fuller accounts of American history remain big draws. Last year, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of ​African American History and Culture in Washington drew 1.4 million visits, while the National Museum of the American Indian drew more than 620,000. The Smithsonian Institution did not respond to a request for comment on whether its museums had altered exhibits or curatorial work to comply with Trump’s “restoring truth and sanity to American history” order.The National Museum of African American History and Culture said its ⁠programming for the 250th anniversary will “explore the nation’s pursuit of a more perfect ​union”.“History is remembering the full scope of the past, whether it supports or undermines a political goal,” said Howard University history professor Ibram X Kendi.Meanwhile, new application language for federal African American history and culture museums grants led many to forego applying, according to John Dichtl, president and chief executive of the American Association for State and Local History, potentially leaving some long-standing museums with uncertain finances.The Institute of Museum and Library Services, a small federal agency that distributes the grants, now welcomes projects that “foster in all generations a greater appreciation ... through uplifting and positive narratives of our shared American experience”.“It makes one wonder what was pushed out of the way to make room for that,” Dichtl said. The Institute of Museum and Library Services did not provide a comment.Trump administration officials have rejected accusations of historical erasure, saying the goal is not to eliminate difficult chapters of the American story but to restore greater emphasis on the nation’s founding ideals, including freedom of religion and speech.The White House-backed Freedom 250 initiative has promoted patriotic education and public programming tied to the nation’s founding through a public-private partnership organisation.A video message from US president Donald Trump plays next to the Wall of American Heroes inside a Freedom Truck in Washington. Photograph: Al Drago/Getty Images Its Freedom Trucks – mobile museums housed in tractor-trailers – have travelled the country with exhibits on the Declaration of Independence, George Washington and the Revolutionary War, with limited inclusion of slavery and experiences of minorities in the founding era.“Our role is to integrate different initiatives so ‌Americans can celebrate through one connected experience,” Keith Krach, chief executive of Freedom 250, ⁠said in a May interview with Reuters.Clifford Murphy, director of the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, said the institution’s work around the 250th anniversary is rooted in presenting American history as both celebration and reflection, even amid broader debates over historical erasure.For many historians and academics, the concern is not the celebration of the founding era but what they believe is being left out. Kimberlé Crenshaw, a law professor and scholar who helped shape critical race theory, said public institutions risk encouraging celebration while ‌minimising harms caused by policies and systems that helped shape the nation.“If our mainstream institutions are not going to critically engage with our past, then we have to ask: What is your role in this democracy?” Crenshaw said.Ann Burroughs, president of the Japanese American National Museum, said preserving difficult history is essential, noting that more than 120,000 people of ​Japanese ancestry – most of them US citizens – were incarcerated during the second World War. She called the camps “a very dark part of American history” and said the museum has not changed its programming under Trump’s order and has since refused ​to apply for federal grants.“It [Japanese American history] tells the story of confronting the truth about race and why it’s important for us to stand up against authoritarianism,” she said.For Indigenous communities, advocates say their history has long been marginalised in American classrooms and public memory, often reduced to textbook mentions around Thanksgiving.“This has been a continuum of failure, but even more so now,” said Joshua Arce, president of the Partnership With Native Americans non-profit. – Reuters[ Keith Duggan: Simpsons episode a deft reflection of US politics as America marks 250 yearsOpens in new window ]