Smithsonian chief to retire as Trump fights to reshape the institution

The Smithsonian Institution's top official, Lonnie G. Bunch III, is retiring, ushering in a seismic transition at the nation's museum and research organization just as President Donald Trump intensifies his campaign to influence its portrayal of American history. Bunch, the 73-year-old historian who founded the National Museum of African American History and Culture and then became the Smithsonian's first Black leader, publicly announced Tuesday that he is stepping down after more than seven years in the institution's top job. Bunch plans to depart by the end of the year, the Smithsonian said in a statement. Bunch's resignation comes at one of the most politically fraught moments in the Smithsonian's 180-year history. Since March 2025, Trump has sought to purge what he calls 'improper ideology' from its museums, while his administration has threatened the institution's federal funding, tried to fire a museum director and challenged its authority over personnel and exhibitions. But the president does not choose the Smithsonian secretary. That power belongs to its governing body, the Board of Regents, which is made up of high-level government officials, members of Congress and citizens appointed by Congress. As vice president, JD Vance sits on that 17-member board, which currently includes two vacant seats. Sign up for the Breaking News newsletter Get the latest breaking news as it happens. By clicking Sign up, you agree to our privacy policy. Bunch said in an interview with The Washington Post on Monday that the administration's pressure played no role in his decision and that he was still ready to do battle to protect the Smithsonian's autonomy. 'We're at a time when people are challenging that independence,' he said, 'but I feel very strongly that it is as independent as we were before, and that I will continue to fight - for as long as I'm in this chair - for the independence of the Smithsonian.' Bunch said he had been contemplating retirement for about a year and settled on leaving after spending several weeks this summer with his children and grandchildren. He originally planned to serve five years as secretary but eventually decided to stay into the nation's 250th anniversary year and through the approaching 10th anniversary of the African American history museum. 'For, I don't know, 45 years, work has taken precedence over family, and I just said at 73, enough's enough,' Bunch said. 'There's never a good time, but I think the key is I want to be able to have as many years as I can with the family and the grandkids.' Bunch informed the executive committee of the Board of Regents about his decision last week. He declined to say whether anyone encouraged him to stay or leave but said he wanted to remain long enough to ensure 'a peaceful transfer of power' and avoid leaving the Smithsonian 'in the lurch.' His exit will conclude nearly 38 years of service at the Smithsonian. Bunch first joined the institution in 1978 and worked at the National Air and Space Museum, National Museum of American History and in various other posts throughout the institution. He also served as a curator at the California African American Museum, and spent four years in the early aughts as president of the Chicago Historical Society. In 2005 he returned to the institution to build the African American history museum. When he took over the project, it had no building, no collection, no funding and a staff of one. The museum opened with a star-studded celebration on the National Mall in 2016 and has since drawn more than 13 million visitors. That achievement cemented Bunch's reputation as both a historian willing to confront some of the country's most painful history and a politically adept operator who could win bipartisan support and raise enormous sums of money. Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who serves as the head of the Board of Regents, praised Bunch for pursuing 'excellence in the telling of our Nation's story' throughout his career and said the regents had 'benefited greatly from his wisdom, vision, and leadership.' 'We look forward to working with him in the coming months to ensure a smooth transition for his successor,' Roberts said in a statement. When he became Smithsonian secretary in June 2019, Bunch said he wanted the institution to be more than a place where tourists went to see artifacts. He wanted it to be 'a place that matters' - where Americans could wrestle with contemporary disputes using history, science and scholarship. 'You make sure that the scholarship is sound, that the things you want to do are not shaped by politics but shaped by the research,' Bunch told The Post shortly after taking office. He called the Smithsonian 'part of the glue that holds this country together.' Seven years later, the institution's ability to remain outside partisan politics has become the defining challenge of Bunch's final period in office. Trump signed an executive order in March 2025 accusing the Smithsonian of coming under the sway of a 'divisive, race-centered ideology' and directing Vance and White House official Lindsey Halligan to remove 'improper ideology' from the institution. The White House subsequently identified exhibitions and other material it opposed, often targeting discussions of race, slavery, immigration and transgender identity. Trump complained publicly that the Smithsonian was too focused on 'how bad slavery was.' The confrontation became more pointed in May 2025 when Trump said that he had fired Kim Sajet, the longtime director of the National Portrait Gallery, calling her highly partisan and a supporter of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. The Smithsonian's regents pushed back. After a tense meeting, they publicly affirmed that personnel decisions belonged to the secretary, with oversight by the board. Sajet nevertheless resigned four days later, saying her departure was the best way to serve the institution. Bunch told The Post on Monday that he had wanted her to remain. 'I made clear that she could stay, that I would fight for her,' he said. 'I think she was one of the strong directors of the Smithsonian, and we would be in a better place with her here. But the reality is, she made a decision, and I would support her decision.' The pressure soon expanded beyond personnel. The White House demanded information about exhibits and curatorial practices at eight Smithsonian museums and said it expected 'content corrections' to material it considered divisive. Bunch responded by telling employees that the Smithsonian would conduct its own review and that he had told Trump during a White House lunch that the institution's 'independence is paramount.' This summer, the White House escalated again, with a 162-page report accusing the National Museum of American History of 'extreme political activism' and portraying the American story as one of 'regret, tragedy, and shame.' The administration has also threatened to withhold federal money already approved for the Smithsonian if the institution falls short of its demands. Bunch, who generally avoided publicly confronting Trump, responded unusually forcefully. He told Smithsonian employees the report was 'not a fair characterization' of the museum and said its work remained driven by 'scholarship, accuracy, and an uncompromising commitment to tell the fullness of America's story.' In the interview with The Post, Bunch rejected the notion that the administration has taken control of the institution's decisions. 'There were things that I felt were important for the Smithsonian to do, to stand firm on,' he said, adding: 'I want to do what's best for the Smithsonian. Sometimes that means I fight directly. Sometimes that means that I take a circular route.' Bunch has spent much of his career arguing that museums should confront, rather than avoid, the difficult parts of the American past. In his 2019 memoir, 'A Fool's Errand,' he recalled giving Trump a tour of the African American history museum in 2017. Bunch wrote that he entered the encounter believing 'it was not my job to make the rough edges of history smooth, even for the president.' Asked whether Trump is now trying to smooth those rough edges, Bunch said he had not had that conversation directly with the president. But, he added, 'I think that there are people in the organization who want to smooth those rough edges, and I would argue very strongly that the role of the Smithsonian is not to erase history, not to run away.' Bunch's tenure also reshaped the Smithsonian beyond its confrontations with Trump. The institution adopted a policy allowing museums to return objects acquired through looting or unethical practices, including Benin bronzes. After a Post investigation into the Smithsonian's collection of human remains, including brains taken largely from Black and Indigenous people, Bunch apologized and established a task force to determine how the institution should address those collections. He also shepherded the early development of two museums created by Congress in 2020, the Smithsonian American Women's History Museum and the National Museum of the American Latino. Last week, the regents selected the historic Arts and Industries Building on the Mall as the permanent home of the Latino museum. And Bunch has overseen a fundraising campaign that has surpassed its goal of $2.5 billion, the largest in Smithsonian history. Bunch said that support helped convince him that he had accomplished the goal he set when he became secretary: making the Smithsonian matter to Americans, rather than merely attracting visitors. The regents will determine who, if anyone, serves as interim secretary and how they will conduct the search for a permanent replacement, Bunch said. He might be asked for suggestions for an interim leader, he said, but emphasized that the decision is not his. The next secretary's first responsibility, he said, would be 'to protect the institution,' while thinking creatively about its financial and political support. Until then, he added, protecting the Smithsonian's independence remains his responsibility. 'America is not afraid of its own history,' Bunch said. 'My job is always to help the Smithsonian tell complicated stories that really allow us to understand the fullness of the American experience.' The institution's deep history helps him do that, Bunch said. For 180 years, it has been there to serve the American people as 'a reservoir they can dip into for understanding of science, of history, of art.' 'For me, it is really building on the Smithsonian's long history of saying, 'No matter what, we will be independent.''