As the shutdown of the US federal government approaches its third week, the country’s largest network of museums and research facilities, the Smithsonian Institution, has temporarily closed all of its doors. The closure came into effect at the end of the day on Saturday (11 October).
The Smithsonian manages 21 museums around Washington, DC, and in New York, as well as the National Zoo and 14 research facilities. It had previously said it could rely on remaining funds from past fiscal years to remain open, originally for “at least” five days past the 1 October shutdown, then until Saturday (11 October). But with no resolution in sight to the funding standoff between Republicans and Democrats in Congress, the Smithsonian has now joined the National Gallery of Art (NGA)—shuttered since the evening of 4 October—in closing its doors.
The Smithsonian group includes many of the most-visited institutions in the US capital, such as the National Air and Space Museum (which receives more than eight million visitors annually) and the National Museum of African American History and Culture, which had 1.6 million visitors last year, according to The Art Newspaper’s most recent global survey of museum attendance. The Smithsonian receives around 53% of its overall funding (which totalled $1.09bn in fiscal year 2024) via appropriations determined by the US Congress.
The Smithsonian has come under pressure from President Donald Trump since his return to power in January. The institution (and the NGA) quickly complied with an executive order banning federally funded organisations from pursuing diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. In May, Trump tried to fire Kim Sajet, the director of the National Portrait Gallery, which is part of the Smithsonian; Sajet resigned two weeks later.
In August, the White House launched efforts to undertake a sweeping review of curatorial, programming and operational processes at eight Smithsonian museums. In a subsequent social media tirade, Trump accused the Smithsonian of being “out of control, everything discussed is how horrible our country is, how bad slavery was and how unaccomplished the downtrodden have been”. The Smithsonian’s secretary Lonnie G. Bunch, following a “cordial” lunch with Trump, then asserted that the institution would continue with its own “ongoing” internal programming audit rather than comply with the White House’s.
