April 23, 2025
At Densho, we know what it means to have your history distorted or silenced. Our organization was founded to ensure that the stories of Japanese Americans, especially those forcibly removed and incarcerated during WWII, would not be forgotten. This is why we are deeply concerned by a recent executive order signed last month, ironically titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity in American History.” This order directs the Smithsonian Institute to remove all “divisive narratives” and “race-centered ideology” that cast the United States in “a negative light,” part of the Trump administration’s ongoing efforts to erase race from American history.
Purporting to restore the Smithsonian to “its rightful place as a symbol of inspiration and American greatness,” the order withholds funding for programs that promote an “improper ideology” and foster “a sense of national shame” by acknowledging racial injustice in our history. It also directs the Smithsonian to scrub references to trans women from the American Women’s History Museum, and hints at the reinstallation of Confederate monuments that have been removed or replaced in recent years.
This censorship at the Smithsonian is part of a disturbing, and quickly escalating, attempt to erase and exclude marginalized histories from our national consciousness. The past several weeks have seen devastating cuts to the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the National Endowment for Humanities, the removal of stories like the 442nd Regimental Combat Team from government websites, extensive censorship within Executive Branch departments, and threats to withhold public school funding over programs promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion. These ongoing attacks show a clear pattern of historical repression.
But let’s be clear: We cannot honor the “richness of American history” by refusing to acknowledge the entirety of that history. We cannot “progress toward becoming a more perfect Union” without a clear understanding of where we began and what we are progressing from.
History is complex. It is not black or white — injustice coexists alongside achievement. Our founding fathers established the democratic freedoms and ideals that still shape our country today, while also owning slaves and facilitating the dispossession of Indigenous peoples. President Franklin Roosevelt created a social safety net that helped lift millions of Americans out of poverty, while also forcibly removing and incarcerating more than 125,000 Japanese Americans in U.S. concentration camps during World War II.
We must be able to hold both injustice and achievement, negative and positive, at the same time. We must acknowledge our past wrongs in order to learn from them and not repeat them in the future.
At Densho, our work is grounded in the belief that archives and museums should be places that promote curiosity about those contradictions and cultivate a deeper understanding of the full scope of history and human experience. Censorship doesn’t “restore truth” to our history; it obscures it.
As archivists, it is our job to preserve a full, un-redacted record of history. We don’t get to pick and choose which stories go into the archive based on whether or not it fits a certain narrative or might make some people uncomfortable. These photos, letters, oral histories, government records, and other primary source materials speak for themselves. They allow future generations to learn about historical events directly from those who experienced it firsthand, and to make their own decisions about what to do with that knowledge. So who is really doing the “ideological indoctrination” here — the keepers of history, or those who seek to erase it?
These increasing efforts to erase certain chapters of our history are alarming, but they are not without precedent. Community archives like Densho are a direct response to previous attempts to exclude marginalized voices from traditional archives and narratives about our history. The stories preserved by Densho are a testament to the care and support of our community, and to our collective refusal to let this history be forgotten.
Together, we will continue to preserve and share the stories of Japanese American WWII incarceration. We will continue to provide free, open access to our digital archives so that current and future generations can learn about this history from those who lived it. We will keep community history in community hands, and we will not allow these stories to be erased on our watch.
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By the Densho Archives Team
Caitlin Oiye Coon, Archives Director
Sara Beckman, Digital Archivist
Christen Greenhill Robichaud, Processing Archivist
Micah Merryman, Archivist
Dina Moreno, Processing Archivist