190: Who Tells America's Story?

What happens when a government decides that one of the greatest threats to its future isn't an armed force — but a cultural institution?On July 4th, America's 250th birthday, the White House Domestic Policy Council released a 162-page report accusing the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History of "ideological capture." Twenty days later, the President signed a second executive order directing federal agencies to force the museum to change how it tells the country's story. Host Bill Cleveland lays out the specifics: the named exhibits, the named staff, the quiet stall in confirming new members of the Smithsonian's governing board — and asks what it means when a nation stops trusting itself to hold a complicated history.Drawing on decades of work with artists in Serbia, Cambodia, Northern Ireland, and Watts, California, and revisiting labor leader Ken Grossinger's conversation about Bryan Stevenson's Legacy Sites in Montgomery Alabama, Cleveland makes the case that culture is never a side issue. Authoritarian movements go after artists first, not for their political power, but because artists shape imagination itself. This episode is about why museums, memorials, and community art aren't warehouses of old objects, but living civic spaces where democracy is practiced, one story at a time.In this episode we explore:How an government report, an executive order, and a quiet stall in board appointments aren't three separate stories, they're one strategy for defining and controlling America's history moving through official channels.Why authoritarian movements attack culture first because stories shape what people believe is possible, before governments can control people, they go for the imagination.Democracy isn't only a system to defend; it's a creative practice — rehearsed in murals, story circles, museums, and neighborhood theater as much as in legislatures.If this show sparks your curiosity we invite you to visit this ART IS CHANGE Collection: Art In Action: Stories of Artists Making a Difference in These Tumultuous TimesNotable Mentions People• Lonnie G. Bunch III — 14th Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution; responded to the White House report by defending the museum's commitment to "scholarship, accuracy" and telling the fullness of America's story.• Bryan Stevenson — Founder and Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative; led the creation of the Legacy Museum, National Memorial for Peace and Justice, Freedom Monument Sculpture Park, and Montgomery Square in Montgomery, Alabama.• Ken Grossinger — Labor and social-justice strategist, author of Art Works: How Organizers and Artists Are Creating a Better World Together, and guest on a prior Art Is Change episode discussing the EJI Legacy Sites.• Alice Lovelace — Atlanta-based poet, performer, and cultural organizer; a recurring voice on the podcast, quoted here on how every generation believes it's living through unprecedented times. Organizations &amp; Institutions• The Charles F. Kettering Foundation — The Charles F. Kettering Foundation, headquartered in Dayton, Ohio, is a nonpartisan, nonprofit, operating foundation with a mission to advance inclusive democracies worldwide by fostering citizen engagement, promoting government accountability, and countering authoritarianism.• Democracy and the Arts — The Kettering Foundation’s focus area for integrating the power of the arts into democratic life locally, nationally, and globally.• Center for the Study of Art and Community — The producing organization behind Art Is Change, founded by Bill Cleveland in 1991 to build partnerships between artists and communities.• Smithsonian Institution / National Museum of American History — The federal museum complex, and specifically the history museum, at the center of the report and executive orders discussed in this episode.• Smithsonian Board of Regents — The 17-member body that governs the Smithsonian, including the Vice President and the Chief Justice; currently has unfilled seats amid an unusually slow confirmation process.• White House Domestic Policy Council — The office that produced the "Saving America's Story" report and is directed, under the July 24 order, to help enforce its recommendations.• Charles F. Kettering Foundation — Nonpartisan foundation whose Democracy and the Arts program partnered with Art Is Change to produce this Art in Action series.• Equal Justice Initiative — Montgomery, Alabama-based human rights organization founded by Bryan Stevenson; operates the Legacy Sites referenced in Part Two. Publications, Exhibits &amp; Curricula• "Saving America's Story: How Ideological Capture at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History Erases Our Heritage" — The 162-page White House Domestic Policy Council report released July 4, 2026, that touched off the events discussed in this episode.• Executive Order 14253, "Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History" — Signed March 27, 2025; ordered the review of the Smithsonian that produced the July 2026 report.• "Restoring Trust in the Smithsonian Institution" — The second executive order, signed July 24, 2026, directing federal agencies to act on the report's findings.• "Many Voices, One Nation" — Permanent NMAH exhibition exploring how many communities have shaped the nation; named in the White House report as an example of the museum's approach.• "Upending 1620: Where Do We Begin?" — NMAH exhibit examining early encounters between Wampanoag peoples and English colonists, also cited in the report.• "American Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith" — NMAH exhibition on the evolving American experiment in self-government.• "Becoming US" — NMAH's national education curriculum teaching U.S. history through the lens of migration; criticized in the White House report.• "Block Bridge Build: Stories of Activist Artists and Cultural Organizers Making a Difference in These Tumultuous Times" — A collection of ART IS CHANGE episodes that explore how arts activism and cultural organizing function as pro-democracy infrastructure. Historical Events &amp; Movements• The Milošević era in Serbia (1989–2000) — The period of authoritarian rule in Serbia during which Cleveland worked with Belgrade theater artists engaged in public, improvisational protest.• <a...