WASHINGTON — Lonnie Bunch III, the first African American to lead the Smithsonian Institution, will retire as secretary at the end of 2026, he said Tuesday, Sept. 8, amid President Donald Trump’s sustained campaign to police how the museums tell American history.

Bunch, 73, appointed in 2019 after building the National Museum of African American History and Culture, framed the exit as personal timing — and did not pretend the job had been calm. “There is no place like the Smithsonian – it has been one of the great loves of my life,” he said in a statement reported by the Guardian. To the New York Times he added: “It was really just saying, now’s the time… I have to be honest, it has been stressful. And at a certain point, I’d like to wake up in the morning and not look at my cellphone.”

“I leave with pride and sadness, gratitude and joy, and with enormous confidence in the people who will carry this remarkable institution forward.”

Executive orders, firings, and “win, not feel good”

Trump largely left the Smithsonian alone in his first term. In March 2025, back in office, he signed an executive order accusing the museums of a “divisive, race-centered ideology” and ordering steps to restore them as a “symbol of inspiration and American greatness.” Two months later he tried to fire National Portrait Gallery director Kim Sajet; Bunch pushed back and the Smithsonian said hiring and firing authority sat with the secretary — Sajet resigned anyway in June 2025. In July, Trump ordered the National Museum of American History to display signs accusing it of inaccuracy; those signs had not yet appeared as of the Guardian’s Tuesday report.

Bunch told the Times he chose battles carefully: “My goal has been to win, not to make me feel good… To win – to protect the Smithsonian – there were times I would fight, make clear what the red lines were. And there were other times I let things go.”

His replacement will be chosen by the Smithsonian’s 17-member Board of Regents, chaired by Chief Justice John Roberts and including Vice President JD Vance, six members of Congress, and private citizens. Three citizen seats recently expired without announced Trump replacements — a quiet way for the White House to shape the next secretary without rewriting the charter. Roberts praised Bunch for pursuing “excellence in the telling of our nation’s story.”

Museums are supposed to argue with the past, not take dictation from the executive branch. Bunch’s exit does not settle that fight. It just hands the next secretary a phone that still buzzes before breakfast.

Sources