As America’s semiquincentennial rolls around, is the Trump Administration whitewashing the evils of America’s history? The PBS News Hour thinks so. On their “Politics Monday” segment with pollster Amy Walter and NPR White House reporter Tamara Keith, co-host Geoff Bennett asked his guests about the White House installing a statute of Christopher Columbus on the grounds.
Tamara Keith: [Anti-wokeness] is a strong focus of the president. Whether it's a distraction for others or not, he's very focused on it. And this is the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. President Trump has a very specific view of what should be part of American history. He is attempting to airbrush American history, to sort of remove any hints that maybe America wasn't always perfect.
And this statement from Davis Ingle, a White House spokesman, just part of it here, I think gets at this: "President Trump has rightly hailed Christopher Columbus as the original American hero, a giant of Western civilization." This is very in line with the way President Trump views America. He's also working on this Garden of American Heroes, which are statues that were removed from town squares because of complicated history.
Or perhaps Trump is fighting against the corrosive liberal idea, ascendant among professors and curators, that America, and only America, must constantly obsess over its historical flaws and downplay its world-changing achievements.
Earlier in the show, during the "news wrap," Bennett explained how controversial the Columbus statue was on the Left: "The original was toppled and tossed into Baltimore's Inner Harbor during the 2020 racial justice protests following the death of George Floyd. Other statues of Columbus were taken down at the height of those protests for his role in colonization. The White House has called Columbus a hero."
On March 18, senior reporter Judy Woodruff also suggested the Trump Administration was airbrushing American history. Her main source was Alan Spears of the National Parks Conservation Association who laid out liberal straw men.
Alan Spears: There are some folks who feel like, in the name of combating diversity, equity and inclusion, in the name of fighting or combating or pushing back against wokeness, that we have to restore our history to a point where it simply celebrates everything that's happened in this country. And if you have challenging elements of our history, the forced removal of indigenous people and tribes, the issue of slavery, emancipation, the civil rights movement, those sorts of things, those elements complicate our national narrative.
Later, Spears gave the game away:
Spears: I think that there are people who are overly concerned about balance, because they're not seeing that we have had to come from almost nothing to get to a point where we have a minimum amount of information available to the public at these places about race, about labor, about women's rights, about the LGBTQ experience, and these things that are important, equally important, in American history….
Yes, that’s the problem: Too much ideological balance in federal museums and landmarks!
A transcript is available, click “Expand.”
PBS News Hour
3/23/26
7:43:06 p.m. (ET)
GEOFF BENNETT: We should also, before we wrap up this conversation, talk about what happened over the weekend. We reported the White House installed this statue of Christopher Columbus. It was a replica. You see it there. It`s a replica of the one that was torn down in 2020.
And he also approved a commemorative coin that bears his own image, President Trump`s image. I`m not sure we have a picture of that.
But Amy, what`s the -- strategy is not the right word. There might not be a strategy. But what does this symbolism, what does this iconography, what does it suggest?
AMY WALTER: This is a president who has long loved seeing his name on things, buildings, et cetera. So that`s not particularly new.
But it`s also a president who wants -- who believes very strongly in putting his stamp on Washington, not just figuratively, but literally, this will stand the test of time.
It`s also -- going back to Tam`s point, especially with the Christopher Columbus statue, it`s going back to the things that have traditionally worked for the president, especially when it`s about keeping his base engaged and excited are things that evoke what that Christopher Columbus statue looks, which is, we`re in a battle for the identity of the U.S. The left is supporting this woke ideology. We`re supporting sort of where real Americans are.
So it is his comfortable place. And that is also the place, when he`s talking about those things, his base does get united, even as they`re getting divided, at least in Congress, on this issue of the shutdown.
GEOFF BENNETT: How do you read it, Tam? Is it symbolism as politics or distraction from bigger challenges, or both?
TAMARA KEITH: It is a strong focus of the president. Whether it`s a distraction for others or not, he`s very focused on it.
And this is the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. President Trump has a very specific view of what should be part of American history. He is attempting to airbrush American history, to sort of remove any hints that maybe America wasn`t always perfect.
And this statement from Davis Ingle, a White House spokesman, just part of it here, I think gets at this: "President Trump has rightly hailed Christopher Columbus as the original American hero, a giant of Western civilization."
This is very in line with the way President Trump views America. He`s also working on this Garden of American Heroes, which are statues that were removed from town squares because of complicated history.
