After a notable series of congressional hearings in July 2026 on alleged ideological influence at the Smithsonian, a resurfaced video from February 2025 shows Anthea Hartig, Director of the National Museum of American History, describing history as a "prime tool of social justice."

In the presentation to University of California, Los Angeles students, Hartig outlined how the museum is adopting an "equity-based, justice forward, community driven and necessarily humble approach to public history and to service." She emphasized that the United States' "long and violent racial history continues to be present in our reckoning."

Hartig stated that "redress in the form of reparation... goes beyond acknowledgement of wrongdoing; it should leverage responsibility, it should think about the act of correction, as we pursue restorative justice and, for us [on the call], restorative justice through history."

During her testimony on Capitol Hill in July 2026, Hartig defended the Smithsonian’s commitment to scholarship, accuracy, independence, and nonpartisanship, asserting that the museum does not take sides in political debates but preserves evidence of American life for the public to draw their own conclusions.

The presentation began with a land acknowledgement and included a slide showing an American flag defaced with the words "Defund the Police," which Hartig said was from a Black Lives Matter protest in Washington, D.C., in 2020. She also noted the museum's participation in a Smithsonian-wide effort to collect and preserve objects related to the Black Lives Matter movement, which began in 2012.

Since fall 2019, Hartig said, all exhibitions, signage, and digital projects at the museum have been at least bilingual in English and Spanish, with some including additional languages depending on the communities involved.

The congressional hearings included testimony from figures such as Matthew Spalding, dean of Hillsdale College's Van Andel Graduate School of Government, and a Pluribus Unum Senior Fellow from The Heritage Foundation, focusing on the Smithsonian's efforts to reshape American history.

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