You may recall that Trump announced he had fired Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery Director Kim Sajet late last month. But as I wrote in my post about that, it seemed pretty clear Trump did not have the authority to do so. The head of the Smithsonian came to the same conclusion and the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents publicly agreed. One member of that board is John Roberts, chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
The regents’ response is a direct refutation of Trump’s authority. On Monday night, the Board issued a statement saying, “All personnel decisions are made by and subject to the direction of the Secretary, with oversight by the Board. Lonnie G. Bunch, the Secretary, has the support of the Board of Regents in his authority and management of the Smithsonian.”
That must have sent Trump’s baby fingers a-quiver.
Meanwhile, Sajet “has continued to report for work, conducting meetings and handling other museum business as she did before,” The Washington Post reports.
However, this fight far from over.
Philip Kennicott, art and architecture critic for The Washington Post, told the PBS News Hour that the board really just kicked the can down the road and set up a potentially worse fight. “For now” Sajet’s job is secure, Kennicott said. But he pointed out that the board’s statement “also committed the Smithsonian to a very thorough overview of all of the content of its museums. And it really depends on how that overview plays out.”
If that review is “done under pressure from the administration to find what they consider partisanship, not what Smithsonian considers partisanship, then I think the Smithsonian is going to be in a new crisis just a few months for now,” Kennicott continued.
It’s a potential crisis with big implications. “Simply by making the threat to fire Kim Sajet, the president has effectively put the entire Smithsonian on notice,” Kennicott added. “And I would argue he’s put the whole museum sector on notice. Any museum that is taking federal money or federal money derived from state money has got to be wondering, what’s in it for us at this point with the administration watching so closely?”
But every delay and disruption of Trump’s authoritarianism is a win.
