President Trump removed Carla Hayden from her post as Librarian of Congress, drawing praise from conservative groups and fierce backlash from top Democrats.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
President Donald Trump on Thursday dismissed Carla Hayden from her position as Librarian of Congress, according to a spokesperson for the Library of Congress. The decision ends Hayden’s nearly nine-year tenure as the nation’s top librarian, a position she has held since her Senate confirmation under President Barack Obama in 2016.
No formal reason was given for Hayden’s removal. However, her tenure and recent initiatives had come under fire from conservative advocacy groups for promoting “radical gender identity” content in public library collections and featuring authors critical of Trump. The American Accountability Foundation, which accused Hayden of politicizing children’s literature and library curation, praised the firing on X, writing, “Woke & radical Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden has been fired.”
Hayden, the first woman and the first African American to serve as Librarian of Congress, led significant digitization efforts and public engagement campaigns during her time in office. Her official biography notes her push to expand digital access and community outreach, including the 2021 “Of the People” initiative, funded by a $15 million Mellon Foundation grant, which aimed to diversify the Library’s collections.
Democratic lawmakers quickly condemned Trump’s action. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee Ranking Member Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) praised Hayden for expanding access to underserved rural communities and bringing the Library “to the people.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) denounced the move as part of an “ongoing effort to ban books [and] whitewash American history.” He called the firing an “unjust decision.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) linked Hayden’s dismissal to a broader campaign to “dismantle the guardrails of our democracy.” He called on Congress to reform the appointment process, stating, “We must assert our congressional prerogative by making the position of Librarian of Congress appointed by a Congressional commission.”
The Library of Congress, the largest library in the world with over 178 million holdings, also serves as the research hub for Congress and houses the U.S. Copyright Office. While it remains unclear who will succeed Hayden, the political implications of her firing are already reverberating through Washington as debates over book censorship, public access, and federal cultural institutions intensify.