The National Park Service removed an exhibit at the President’s House Site at Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, last week. The “Freedom and Slavery in the Making of a New Nation” exhibit focused on the nine slaves who lived at the location when President George Washington resided there from 1790 to 1797, when Philadelphia was the capital of the United States. Its removal was the result of President Donald Trump’s executive order, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.”
Issued in March 2025, Trump’s directive sought to remove all historical displays that featured a “false reconstruction of American history” and promoted “partisan ideology” that “inappropriately disparages Americans past or living.”
“Over the past decade, Americans have witnessed a concerted and widespread effort to rewrite our Nation’s history, replacing objective facts with a distorted narrative driven by ideology rather than truth,” read Trump’s directive. “This revisionist movement seeks to undermine the remarkable achievements of the United States by casting its founding principles and historical milestones in a negative light.”
“Under this historical revision, our Nation’s unparalleled legacy of advancing liberty, individual rights, and human happiness is reconstructed as inherently racist, sexist, oppressive, or otherwise irredeemably flawed,” read the executive order. “Rather than fostering unity and a deeper understanding of our shared past, the widespread effort to rewrite history deepens societal divides and fosters a sense of national shame, disregarding the progress America has made and the ideals that continue to inspire millions around the globe.”
The Philadelphia exhibit had been open since 2010. National Park Service employees dismantled the displays and removed the panels that provided historical analysis of the site on Thursday. Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration following the removal. She claimed there was a cooperative agreement signed by the city and the federal government that allegedly prohibited such changes without advanced notice.
“We are right now researching and reviewing the cooperative agreement between the City of Philadelphia and federal government that dates back to 2006,” said Parker. “It requires parties to meet and confer if there are any changes to be made to any exhibit, so anything that is outside that agreement, it requires that our Law Department review it.”
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Rep. Dwight Evans (D-PA) called the decision to remove it an “outrage.”
“What the Trump-Vance administration has done to the President’s House exhibit in Philadelphia is an outrage!” Evans said. “Their shameful desecration of this exhibit raises broader, disturbing questions about this administration’s continued abuse of power and commitment to whitewashing history.”
“True patriotism requires facing our nation’s past – and learning from it. The Trump-Vance administration may try to whitewash an exhibit, but they cannot erase the shame of what they have done,” Evans added. “I support the city of Philadelphia’s lawsuit to restore this truthful, accurate, and important exhibit!”