By Stacy M. Brown
Black Press USA Senior National Correspondent

The Trump White House has declared war on history itself. In an official article published Friday, Aug. 22, on the White House website, the administration blasted the Smithsonian Institution for telling the truth about slavery, systemic racism, and inequality in America. It was not just an attack on museums—it was an attack on memory, on facts, and on the lives of generations of Black Americans who endured the country’s greatest crimes.

The White House mocked exhibits at the National Museum of African American History and Culture for daring to explain that America privileges whiteness. It dismissed scholarship on the legacies of slavery in the Texas Revolution, ridiculed art that reckons with the Middle Passage, and condemned programs that document systemic exclusion in immigration and housing. It went further, painting the Smithsonian as “anti-American propaganda” for highlighting the ways colonization, racism, and oppression shaped the very foundations of the nation. What the administration is doing is clear: it is trying to erase the trail of oppression that runs like a scar through U.S. history—from the whip on enslaved backs, to Jim Crow segregation, to the discriminatory policies that persist today.

From Slavery to Jim Crow

Slavery was not just an economic system—it was a regime of terror. Families were ripped apart, women were violated, men were chained, and entire generations were forced into labor that built the wealth of this nation. When emancipation finally came, Reconstruction briefly promised equality. Black men held office, built schools, and claimed rights once denied. But white supremacy roared back with violence and legal restrictions. Reconstruction collapsed, and Jim Crow rose in its place. For nearly a century, Jim Crow laws ensured Black Americans could not vote freely, attend equal schools, or live without fear of lynching. The White House’s attempt to dismiss museums for teaching about this reality is nothing less than an attempt to silence that history.

Redlining and the War on Drugs

When Jim Crow ended, systemic racism mutated. The federal government backed redlining policies that locked Black families out of home ownership, while white families accumulated wealth through suburban expansion. Gentrification decades later uprooted Black communities in cities, pushing families out of neighborhoods they had called home for generations. Then came the war on drugs. Entire communities were criminalized. Harsh sentencing laws and targeted policing filled prisons with Black and brown bodies, devastating families and stripping away economic and political power. The administration now attacking the Smithsonian is the same one that celebrates law-and-order policies that continue this cycle.

Civil Rights Gains Under Siege

The Civil Rights Movement forced America to confront its hypocrisy. Through marches, sit-ins, and court victories, Black Americans dismantled legal segregation. But every gain came with backlash. Today, voter suppression laws, redistricting schemes, and so-called “voter integrity measures” are dressed-up attempts to return to the days when Black voices were excluded. The Smithsonian’s exhibits on democracy document this truth. The White House calls it subversive.

Erasing History to Protect Power

The Trump White House’s attack on the Smithsonian is not accidental. By branding the truth as “anti-American,” the administration seeks to recast America as blameless. The logic is simple: if slavery is just a footnote, if Jim Crow was just the past, if systemic racism never existed, then there is nothing to fix. There is no reason for reparations, no reason for equity, no reason to confront police violence, mass incarceration, or economic injustice. The administration even ridiculed the National Museum of African Art’s exhibit inspired by Drexciya, a myth of children born underwater from enslaved women who died in the Middle Passage. Instead of honoring the resilience behind that vision, the White House dismissed it as “fringe”.

The Fight for Memory

The attempt to rewrite history is part of a wider campaign. This White House has moved to criminalize protest, weaken civil rights protections, and silence Black leaders. Attacking the Smithsonian is about controlling the narrative—deciding whose story matters and whose story gets erased. The truth is this: America’s history is not just one of freedom and triumph. It is also one of bondage, violence, exclusion, and systemic theft of opportunity. To erase that truth is to dishonor every enslaved man, every woman denied her humanity, every family displaced by redlining, every child funneled into mass incarceration. The Smithsonian was created to tell America’s story in full. Today, that mission is under direct assault from a White House that has chosen denial over truth. And if the nation accepts this whitewashing, the suffering of millions will not just be forgotten—it will be erased.

Stacy M. Brown

Posts by Stacy M. Brown

By April Ryan
BlackPressUSA Washington Bureau Chief and White House Correspondent

Following the direction of President Trump, the Smithsonian Museum Institution (The Smithsonian), the world’s largest museum, education and research complex, is being reviewed by lawyers who are tasked with identifying content that could be considered “woke,” particularly as it applies to the subject of slavery.

The president declared that he does not want the nation viewed in a negative light — either in the present or the past. As a result, a disproportionate portion of the review will be focused on the National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC), affectionately known as the “Blacksonian.”

The Smithsonian comprises nineteen museums and galleries and the National Zoo. Eleven of the sites are on the National Mall and include the Lincoln Memorial and the NMAAHC.

NMAAHC curators and staff research and assemble exhibits that accurately present history based upon fact. This includes some exhibits that truthfully depict aspects of the horrors of slavery.

It is no secret that a large percentage of the generational wealth enjoyed today by some of white America would not exist without the exploited free labor of enslaved Africans in this nation’s sugarcane and cotton fields and in other areas.

However, the White House has issued a statement saying that President Trump is right about the Smithsonian being “out of control,” saying that as it “increasingly prioritizes exhibits that undermine our values and rewrite the American story through a lens of grievance and exclusion, the Smithsonian’s embrace of woke ideology distorts history and erodes public trust.”

The statement provides examples of the Smithsonian’s “woke” agendas and exhibits, including a few that many might see as politically motivated, like the National Portrait Gallery commission of a stop-motion drawing animation that examines the career of Anthony Fauci.

Additional examples include:

• The National Museum of African American History and Culture debuted a series to educate people on “a society that privileges white people and whiteness,” defining “white dominant culture“ as “ways white people and their traditions, attitudes, and ways of life have been normalized over time” and portraying the terms, “the nuclear family,” “work ethic,” and “intellect” as white qualities rooted in racism. The exhibit featured content from Ibram X. Kendi, whom The Federalist described as a “purveyor of Woke History.”
• As part of an inclusive purview that the New York Times termed anti- “Wealthy, Pale, and Male,” the National Portrait Gallery featured a choreographed “modern dance performance“ detailing the “ramifications“ of the southern border wall and commissioned an entire series to examine “American portraiture and institutional history… through the lens of historical exclusion.”
• The American History Museum prominently displays the “Intersex-Inclusive Progress Pride flag” at its entrance, which was also flown alongside the American flag at multiple Smithsonian campuses.
• The National Portrait Gallery features art commemorating the act of illegally crossing the “inclusive and exclusionary” southern border — even making it a finalist for one of its awards.
• The National Museum of African Art displayed an exhibit on “works of speculative fiction that bring to life an immersive, feminist and sacred aquatopia inspired by the legend of Drexciya,” an “underwater kingdom populated by the children of pregnant women who had been thrown overboard or jumped into the ocean during the Middle Passage.”
• The American History Museum’s “LGBTQ+ History” exhibit seeks to “understand evolving and overlapping identities such as lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender, queer, transsexual, transvestite, mahu, homosexual, fluid, invert, urning, third sex, two sex, gender-bender, sapphist, hijra, friend of Dorothy, drag queen/king, and many other experiences,” and includes articles on “LGBTQ+ inclusion and skateboarding“ and “the rise of drag ball culture in the 1920s.”
• The National Museum of the American Latino features programming highlighting “animated Latinos and Latinas with disabilities” — with content from “a disabled, plus-sized actress” and an “ambulatory wheelchair user” who “educates on their identity being Latinx, LGBTQ+, and disabled.”
• The National Museum of the American Latino characterizes the Texas Revolution as a “massive defense of slavery waged by ‘white Anglo Saxon’ settlers against anti-slavery Mexicans fighting for freedom, not as a Texan war of independence from Mexico,” and frames the Mexican-American War as “the North American invasion” that was “unprovoked and motivated by pro-slavery politicians.”
• According to the National Museum of the American Latino, “what unites Latinas and Latinos“ is “the Black Lives Matter movement.”
• The American History Museum’s exhibit marking the 50th anniversary of Title IX includes examples of biological men competing in women’s sports and argues in favor of “transgender” athletes competing in sports against the opposite biological sex.
• An exhibit at the American History Museum depicts migrants watching Independence Day fireworks “through an opening in the U.S.-Mexico border wall” and says America’s founders “feared non-White immigration.”
• The American History Museum features a display that refers to the founding of America as “a profound unsettling of the continent.”
• The American History Museum’s “American Democracy” exhibit claims voter integrity measures are “attempts to minimize the political power” of “new and diverse groups of Americans,” while its section on “demonstrations” includes only leftist causes.
• An American History Museum exhibit features a depiction of the Statue of Liberty “holding a tomato in her right hand instead of a torch, and a basket of tomatoes in her left hand instead of a tablet.”
• The National Museum of the American Latino features an anti-American exhibit that defines Latino history as centuries of victimhood and exploitation, suggests the U.S. is stolen land, and characterizes. history as rooted in “colonization.”
  • The exhibit features writing from illegal immigrants “fighting to belong.”
  • The exhibit displays a quote from Claudia de la Cruz, the socialist nominee for president and a director of an anti-American hate group, as well as another quote that reads, “We didn’t cross the border; the border crossed us.”
  • The exhibit remains prominently featured on its website alongside a quote from the Communist Party USA’s Angela Davis, who was once among the FBI’s Top 10 Most Wanted Fugitives.
• The National Museum of the American Latino describes the post-Mexican-American War California describes a “Californio” family losing their land to American “squatters.”
• The Museum of American Art uses American sculpture “to invite dialogue and reflection on notions of power and identity.”
• The American History Museum’s “Upending 1620” exhibit claims Pilgrims are a “myth,” instead framing them as colonizers.
• The American History Museum’s exhibit about Benjamin Franklin focuses almost solely on slavery, directing visitors to learn more about his “electrical experiments and the enslaved people of his household,” noting his “scientific accomplishments were enabled by the social and economic system he worked within.”
• The National Portrait Gallery was set to feature a “painting depicting a transgender Statue of Liberty” before the artist withdrew it.
• The former interim director of the future Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum declared the museum will be “inclusive” of biological men posing as women.

In a nation that was at least partially founded on the concept of free speech, the administration’s position challenges the boundaries of censorship at the same time that it begs the question, “Are there limits to the types and content of speech that is federally funded? If so, who should be the determinant of those limits?

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of BlackPressUSA.com or the National Newspaper Publishers Association.

Oakland Post

Posts by Oakland Post

By Stacy Brown
Black Press USA Senior National Correspondent

As Trump Attempts to Minimize Slavery, Book Details the Consequences of the Transatlantic Slave Trade

New York, NY—Civil Rights icon and National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) President and CEO Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. and renowned journalist and NNPA Senior National Correspondent Stacy M. Brown collaborated on the groundbreaking book The Transatlantic Slave Trade: Overcoming the 500-Year Legacy, which is now available from Select Books (ISBN 978-1-59079-569-9). Released on October 8, 2024, this work explores the brutal legacy of the transatlantic slave trade and its ongoing impact on African people throughout the world.

This searing book offers an unflinching account of the 500-year legacy of the transatlantic slave trade, beginning in 1500 with the abduction of millions of Africans and following the historical arc through centuries of oppression, Jim Crow-era terror, and modern systemic racism. The book is an unapologetic examination of how the horrors of the past—rooted in slavery—continue to manifest in present-day America through police brutality, mass incarceration, economic disparities, and educational inequality.

Chavis, a central figure in the civil rights movement, draws on his decades of activism and personal experiences in the fight for equal justice. As a young activist with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), Dr. Chavis worked under Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and later became a prominent leader within the United Church of Christ Commission for Racial Justice, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA). His wrongful imprisonment as the leader of the Wilmington Ten in 1971—a group of political prisoners falsely convicted and imprisoned for untruthful allegations of arson during the civil rights movement in North Carolina—serves as a vivid reminder of the institutionalization of racial discrimination in America that continues to suppress the human rights of communities of color.

“This book does not simply chronicle history; it challenges readers to face the lasting consequences of the transatlantic slave trade,” says Dr. Chavis. “The blood, sweat, and tears of enslaved Africans laid the very foundation for the American experiment in democracy, yet their descendants are still fighting for equality and justice in every facet of American life.”

Isiah Thomas, a legend in the NBA, highlights the importance of this work in his stirring words, which support Dr. Chavis’s call to action:

“Dr. Ben Chavis must continue to fight and tell this story, not just for our generation, but for future generations who must understand the truth about our history if they are to finish righting the wrongs that began over 400 years ago,” Thomas emphasizes that this book is a vital tool in paving the way for future generations, ensuring that they are armed with the unvarnished truth.

Arikana Chihombori-Quao, African Union Ambassador to the United States, underscores the importance of the book’s message:

“Dr. Chavis connects the dots from the slave ports of West Africa to the present-day struggles of Black Americans. The transatlantic slave trade was not just a historical event—it laid the groundwork for centuries of racial oppression. The fight against that legacy is still ongoing.”

The Transatlantic Slave Trade: Overcoming the 500-Year Legacy digs deep into the trauma of the Middle Passage, where millions of Africans were stripped of their dignity, crammed into ships like cargo, and forced into lives of unimaginable brutality. Yet, as Chavis and Brown remind us, the legacy of slavery is not confined to the past. The authors draw powerful connections between historical atrocities and modern-day issues such as redlining, environmental racism, economic injustice, and mass incarceration.

The book pulls no punches in confronting America’s hypocrisy: while African slaves built the economic foundation of the nation, their descendants are still treated as second-class citizens. From the auction blocks of the 1700s to the prison industrial complex of the 21st century, The Transatlantic Slave Trade unveils the continued systemic structures designed to oppress Black communities.

As legendary hip-hop icon, Chuck D of Public Enemy passionately states in the foreword, “The chains of slavery may have been broken, but the shackles of systemic racism are still very much intact. If you’re not angry, you’re not paying attention.” His call to action resonates throughout the book, echoing the urgent need to confront this history and dismantle the systems of oppression that have evolved from it.

Public Enemy’s track “Can’t Truss It” is a thematic thread in the book, with its unfiltered depiction of the slave trade’s legacy. The song’s haunting lyrics—“Ninety damn days on a slave ship / Count ’em fallin’ off two, three, four hun’ed at a time”—capture the rage and pain of an entire people. This visceral connection to history is what makes The Transatlantic Slave Trade a powerful rallying cry for justice and equity.

Brown, an award-winning journalist and Senior National Correspondent for the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), brings his keen insight into this exploration of history. Brown has relentlessly advocated for justice and equity, using his platform to shed light on systemic injustices nationwide.

In The Transatlantic Slave Trade, Chavis and Brown challenge readers to reckon with the uncomfortable truths of America’s past—and to acknowledge how those truths continue to shape the realities of today. The authors highlight how the scars of slavery persist in police violence, economic disparity, and the underfunding of Black communities. They demand we face this history head-on without sugarcoating or sanitizing the truth.

This book is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand the historical roots of modern-day racism and the enduring fight for equal justice. As Public Enemy famously said, “Fight the Power.” The Transatlantic Slave Trade is a potent weapon in the ongoing battle for racial equity and justice, reminding us that the struggle continues—and so must our resistance.

The Transatlantic Slave Trade: Overcoming the 500-Year Legacy will be available at major book retailers and online platforms beginning October 8, 2024.

About the Authors

Dr. Benjamin Chavis is a civil rights leader, author, and former Executive Director and CEO of the NAACP. Known for his relentless fight against oppression and his leadership in environmental justice and economic empowerment, Dr. Chavis is a lifelong warrior for social justice. Currently, Chavis is the President and CEO of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA).

Stacy M. Brown is the Senior National Correspondent for the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) and an acclaimed journalist renowned for his in-depth reporting on racial and social justice issues.

For review copies or to schedule an interview with the authors, please contact: Kenichi Sugihara, Select Books, http://www.kenichi@selectbooks.com.

Stacy M. Brown

Posts by Stacy M. Brown