People look at the Gunboat Philadelphia as it's being preserved while they visit the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in November 2025 in Washington, D.C. The museum's director, Anthea Hartig, spoke at a House committee hearing Tuesday amid claims against the museum by the Trump administration. File Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo
July 21 (UPI) -- Anthea Hartig, the director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, spoke up for the museum's work Tuesday, saying it's governed by "standards of scholarship, accuracy, independence and nonpartisanship."
"The museum does not take sides in America's political debates," Hartig told lawmakers at a House subcommittee hearing. "We preserve and document the evidence of American life in all of its breadth, so that the public can encounter the past and draw their own conclusions."
Hartig's appearance at the hearing comes a few weeks after the White House attacked the museum in a report, claiming that it practiced "extreme political activism" in exhibits and language.
Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., later directed Hartig to testify on what he called "misuse of federal funds" and promoting "divisive, politically [biased] revisions of American history." Burchett said in his letter to Hartig that Smithsonian historians "either lack an understanding of the nation's heritage or are determined to blatantly mischaracterize and disparage the American experiment."
