A court-ordered inventory shows the National Park Service removed at least 51 exhibits from 38 sites under President Donald Trump’s directive targeting displays the administration says improperly disparage Americans.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
The National Park Service has removed at least 51 exhibits from 38 sites as part of the Trump administration’s effort to carry out an executive order targeting displays that “inappropriately disparage Americans past or living,” according to a court-ordered inventory filed Wednesday.
The list submitted by the administration includes exhibits from several national parks and monuments. At Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia, officials removed an exhibit describing George Washington’s ownership of enslaved people.
The filing was submitted after U.S. District Judge Angel Kelley in Boston ordered the administration to provide an inventory of removed materials. Kelley ruled Friday that the government was engaged in an unlawful effort to “rewrite the nation’s history with a white-out pen.”
The ruling came in a lawsuit filed by groups representing national park conservationists, historians and scientists. The plaintiffs argued that the administration violated laws governing National Park Service actions.
The Trump administration asked Kelley to pause her order requiring the exhibits to be reinstalled by July 3, one day before the United States marks the 250th anniversary of its founding. In a court filing, the administration described that deadline as a “herculean and unmanageable task.”
The administration said it is appealing Kelley’s decision, which blocked Interior Secretary Doug Burgum from implementing Trump’s March 2025 directive.
Trump’s executive order targeted what he described as a “revisionist movement” that portrayed the United States as “inherently racist, sexist, oppressive or otherwise irredeemably flawed.” The order directed the Interior Department to review and change displays at national parks and related sites.
To evaluate the administration’s request for a stay, Kelley said she needed more information about the scope of the exhibit removals and ordered the government to identify any items that had been taken down.
The inventory included items removed from Fort Sumter in South Carolina, Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge at Gateway National Recreation Area in New York and Acadia National Park in Maine.
At those three sites, materials discussing climate change were removed, according to Friday’s court ruling. The administration’s inventory said the items were discarded because they were unrelated to the “beauty, abundance, and grandeur of the natural landscape.”
A National Park Service official said in an accompanying filing that the inventory is likely only a partial list and that not every item identified for possible removal has been taken down.
Kelley, who was appointed by former President Joe Biden, noted in her ruling that an internal National Park Service database leaked by anonymous civil servants in March listed more than 500 items identified for review and potential removal.
The agency said that, for transparency, the list filed with the court also included six items removed from a 39th national park under a separate Trump executive order.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The case now centers on whether the administration must restore the removed exhibits before July 4 or whether the order will be paused while the appeal proceeds.
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