FACING FUNDING CUTS AND CENSORSHIP THREATS, MUSEUMS BAND TOGETHER

THE NEW YORK TIMES
OCTOBER 16, 2025

“The Trump administration’s threats to the country’s cultural institutions became clear on the President’s first day in office, with a cascading passage of executive orders rejecting, among other things, diversity, equity and inclusion (D.E.I.) programs, gender ideology and what one order called efforts to ‘rewrite history.’ […]

The cultural community is now reeling and searching for answers. Many institutions have shown resilience, and sprouts of resistance are emerging. But the community at large has been slow, or unwilling, to muster an effective counteroffensive. The next few months, many say, will be critical.

[…]

In August the National Coalition Against Censorship, along with the New School’s Vera List Center for Art and Politics, published a statement called ‘Cultural Freedom Demands Collective Courage: A Nationwide Statement of Values and Principles for the Field of Arts and Culture.’ The online document has so far been signed by more than 800 individual signatories as well as over 250 arts organizations.”

—Sam Lubell, The New York Times