President Donald Trump sought a gift for King Charles during a state visit last month, and so Trump’s administration looked for an artifact related to Dwight D. Eisenhower, given the past President’s ties to England during World War II. Plans for the gift ultimately fell through, however, and now, a museum director mixed up in it all has been fired.
A New York Times report on the director’s firing revealed that a Trump administration official, “using a personal email address,” contacted the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library, Museum, and Boyhood Home in Abilene, Kansas. The institution has at least one sword in its collection, which was gifted to President Eisenhower in 1947 by Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands.
Per the Times report, the library “declined to release the sword or any other original artifact in its collection, on the grounds that they are the property of the U.S. government, which the library is obligated by law to preserve for the American public.”
President Trump eventually gifted a replica of Eisenhower’s West Point Officer’s Sabre to King Charles, reported the Substack newsletter the Last Campaign.
The Last Campaign also reported that the director of the Eisenhower Presidential Library, Todd Arrington, was forced to resign “in lieu of firing” at the direction of James Byron, Special Assistant to Acting Archivist Marco Rubio at the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, earlier this week.
“According to sources, upon instructions from Tamara Martin, director of the Nixon Library and acting executive of the Office of Presidential Libraries, John Hamilton, the deputy director of that office, informed Arrington on Monday, September 29 that he should resign, and that his resignation would be effective the next day,” the Last Campaign reported.
Arrington confirmed to the Times that he had been pressured to resign and was told he “could no longer be trusted with confidential information.” While he did not receive any “noticeable pushback” from his refusal to provide a sword, Arrington “expressed dismay” that the action could have been a factor leading to his forced resignation.
“I never imagined that I would be fired from almost 30 years of government service for this,” Arrington told the Times. “I would absolutely come back in a heartbeat.”
The National Archives did not respond to requests for comment from the Times or the National Campaign, and the shutdown of the federal government means all of its facilities are currently closed. The White House also declined to comment to either media outlet.
