Smithsonian Leader Meets With Trump as Museum Quietly Shutters Latin American Art Gallery
174Sept. 3, 2025
Lonnie G. Bunch III, secretary of theSmithsonian Institution, met with President Donald Trump on August 28 for what the White House described in a statement to theNew York Timesas a “productive and cordial” lunch. The meeting came as the Trump administration continues its sustained attack on the independent entity’s programming, which it claims presents “divisive narratives” and “race-centered ideology.” The White House is in the midst of conducting a sweeping review of the Smithsonian’s twenty-one museums, announced on August 12, “to assess tone, historical framing and alignment with American ideals,” meant “to ensure alignment with the president’s directive to celebrate American exceptionalism, remove divisive or partisan narratives and restore confidence in our shared cultural institutions.”
The same day of the lunch meeting, theNational Museum of American Historyin Washington, DC, one of the institutions under the Smithsonian’s umbrella, closed its Molina Family Latino Gallery, which had been serving as the temporary home of the yet-to-be-built National Museum of the American Latino. The gallery since 2022 had been hosting the exhibition “¡Presente!A Latino History of the United States,” which contained a reproduction of Felipe Galindo Gómez’s 1999 illustration4th of July from the South Border, one of a number of artworks cited by the White House in an unsigned article posted to its website on August 21 listing institutions, exhibitions, and artworks that focused on such topics as race, transgender identity, and immigration.Hyperallergicreported that Galindo traveled from New York to Washington on August 26 to find out whether his work was still up and discovered the exhibition closed: It had ended July 20, four months earlier than planned. Smithsonian officials said the closure was necessary in order for the museum to prepare for the US’s 250th-anniversary celebration. The gallery will reopen in spring 2026 with a salsa-themed exhibition titled “¡Puro Ritmo!”
Established in 1846, the Smithsonian Institution operates independent of the US government, though it receives approximately two thirds of its funding via Congress. The Trump administration has increasingly sought to involve itself in the nonpartisan organization’s business, with Trump claiming on social media this past May to have fired National Portrait Gallery director Kim Sajet for being “a highly partisan person, and a strong supporter of DEI.” The Smithsonian’s board quickly affirmed its autonomy, but Sajet resigned less than a month later.