Is Trump's Patriotic History Fundamentally Dishonest?

Trump Administration Pushes Patriotic instead of Trustworthy American History

If the Trump Administration gets their way, truthful American History curricula will be replaced with biased Patriotic Education in public schools. The Trump Administration is concerned that public schools are not producing students that are adequately “patriotic,” so their plan is to allow only the uplifting and ennobling parts of our history to be taught in K-12 public schools. Not only would the exclusion of a large part of American history be a change to the substance of school curricula, it would remove the responsibility for curriculum development from the States to one of heavy-handed censorship by the federal government. 

“The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.” — George Orwell, 1984

Historically, states control the day-to-day school operations, including setting curriculum standards and educational policy. But the Trump administration wants a radical change. His Administration is mandating that schools teach Patriotism, meaning that the U.S. Department of Education (ED) will now interfere with state development of curricula. The intent is to force students to “love America” by downplaying truths that cast America’s founders and historical events in a dishonorable light. For example, American history includes terrible and inconvenient truths such as: Japanese forced internment during World War II, massacre of native peoples, Thomas Jefferson fathering six children with enslaved Sally Hemings, and the Tulsa massacre that decimated the successful Black-owned Greenwood District in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1921 by a mob of white vigilantes and elected officials.

Trump and his administration were inspired to make this change in anticipation of the upcoming 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Trump was concerned that Americans were not patriotic enough, particularly after the publication of the Pulitzer prizewinning 1619 Project, because it revealed details about the slave trade and enslavement in our country. Trump claimed that the 1619 Project was not only "inaccurate” it was “toxic propaganda” that would negatively influence patriotism in the US. 

Another factor influencing Trump’s desire for change was nationwide protests after George Floyd’s murder in 2020. Trump used those protests to generate fear and racial discord, warning that protests over racial inequality were dangerous and that they threatened the foundations of our political system.

In response to those events, and what the administration alleged was “decades of left-wing indoctrination in our schools”, Trump established the 1776 Commission in 2020 to restore “American education that would be grounded in the principles of our founding that is accurate, honest, unifying, inspiring, and ennobling.” Subsequently, Trump threatened to cut off funding from schools that taught from the 1619 Project; however, two months later, he lost the election and President Biden discontinued that initiative. 

After Trump was re-elected in 2024, he picked up where he left off by insisting on patriotic education. He signed a number of executive orders including “Ending radical indoctrination in K-12 schooling” where he claimed:

• “Parents have witnessed schools indoctrinate their children in radical, anti-American ideologies while deliberately blocking parental oversight;” 

• “Students are forced to accept these ideologies without question or critical examination;” and 

• This “erode[s] critical thinking but also sow[s] division, confusion, and distrust, which undermine[s] the very foundations of personal identity and family unity.” 

He directed Secretary of ED Linda McMahon to develop programs to promote patriotic education, and to release a supplemental priority on Patriotic Education that directed a funding priority to “be used in grant competitions across the Department to promote a civic education that teaches American history, values, and geography with [what she claimed was] an unbiased approach.” 

The Hubris of American Exceptionalism

American exceptionalism is a main component of Patriotic Education. It is the belief that the United States is distinctive, unique, and exemplary compared to other nations. Trump’s plan is to encourage students to love their country unconditionally by teaching only the uplifting parts and ignoring the darkest parts of our country’s past, including slavery, the disenfranchisement of women and African Americans, racial segregation, and crimes and discrimination against LGBTQ+ people.

"American Exceptionalism Is a Dangerous Myth." — New York Magazine headline 

History experts have objected to this. According to Sarah Weicksel, Executive Director of the American Historical Association, “Doing that flattens the past into a set of platitudes that are not rooted in the broader historical context, conflicts, contingencies and change over time that are central to historical thinking” and that view “has a narrow conception of patriotism and patriotic education”. Washington Post contributor Theodore Johnson goes further, suggesting that this planned change in how history is taught “should not be considered patriotism but instead a means of curtailing oversight and constraints on the president.” 

Project 2025, Mandate for Leadership, the Conservative Promise, suggested on pg. 319 that students are taught to be hostile to exceptionalism and that rather than teaching students “to hate their country” and feel guilt, anguish, or other forms of psychological distress because of “actions committed in the past”, those topics should be avoided. Of course, this was said without evidence or scientific basis.

Others have pointed out that true patriotism results from taking a critical look at how our nation has been imperfect, yet we can still respect it and the people who came before us. For example, a recent editorial by Theodore R. Johnson pointed out that knowing how the nation and its people improved over time can give us a true appreciation and feeling of loyalty to the laws, principles, and institutions of our country. One might say that this would be considered true patriotism, versus Trump’s blind , uncritical patriotism.

Many Americans already understand that teaching the ‘dark’ parts of history in addition to the uplifting parts is not unpatriotic, but instead helps to accurately document how our country has evolved and improved. Also, it helps identify where we may still have work to do. By providing the whole truth to students, they develop their own sense of patriotism and appreciate the values central to our country. In contrast, the view of the Administration is a very narrow interpretation of what is patriotic education and their push for patriotic education appears to be a politically motivated power grab rather than education. 

Trump’s attempt to Eliminate African American History and America's Ugly History of Racism 

The term “patriotic education” has become code for teachings that omit or downplay important parts of history, such as slavery and segregation. Since the publication of the 1619 Project, both Trump administrations have called teachings about racism “left wing indoctrination” and “child abuse”. One of the current administration's earliest executive orders threatened to withhold federal funding from schools that taught topics that Trump considered divisive, such as slavery and systemic racism, which they incorrectly labelled Critical Race Theory (CRT). In fact, those topics are not CRT because CRT is actually a legal framework to understand why racial disparities exist, not lessons on topics such as slavery and the civil rights movement. 

The 1619 Project created by Nicole Hannah-Jones and the NYT Magazine

Until recently, history textbooks barely mentioned African American history causing some teachers to rebel against that whitewashing of textbooks. Much to the credit of the 1619 Project, the truth about early African American history became part of K-12 curricula in many school systems.

President Trump’s executive order “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History” has called for a return to whitewashing history of African Americans, seriously limiting what students may be taught and censoring much of the truth about African Americans history. Instead, the Administration used misinformation to justify censoring this part of history education, going so far as to allege that ‘White Privilege’ and ‘unconscious bias,’ actually promote racial discrimination and “undermine national unity.” Another example of the misinformation they share is that slavery should be portrayed positively because it provided education and trades to the enslaved and gave them homes, food, and equal rights. This language is no different than much of the pro-slavery framing in the 19th century U.S. that argued for the "essential" nature of enslavement.  

There is a vigorous effort underway to hide the truth about American History, and Trump released an executive order prohibiting federal funding for exhibits or programs that “divide Americans based on race, or promote programs or ideologies inconsistent with Federal law and policy.” Trump ordered a review of all exhibits hosted by the Smithsonian Institution and the National Park Service, and as a result removal of multiple artifacts that don’t support the patriotic whitewashing push have been removed from public view. The artifacts removed were exhibits that called attention to the brutality of slavery. Most recently an exhibit about George Washington’s slave ownership was removed from Philadelphia’s Independence Mall but Philadelphia is pushing back with a suit against the Trump administration.

The president has threatened to cut off funding from schools that continue to teach material that he considers propaganda, such as Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). However, not all school systems are complying with that order. In 2025, there were court rulings that blocked schools from enforcing the ‘CRT’ ban. However, other suits have been filed against schools for teaching ‘CRT ‘and also against those who suggested ways to get around the ban. The outcome of these competing rulings and the future of African American history in K-12 is yet to be decided. Meanwhile the Administration has abandoned its appeal of a court order blocking Anti-DEI Guidance that had required colleges to eradicate all race-based curriculum, financial aid and student services, or lose federal funding. The motion to dismiss was jointly approved by both the American Federation of Teachers and the ED. 

Also troubling is the Trump Administration’s order to change the mission of the Civil Rights office in the ED. At present, there is a large backlog of cases involving discrimination against African American and transgender students while the office is prioritizing investigation of discrimination claims from White and cisgender students. 

Progressive Ideology and LGBTQ+ Youth Support and Protection

The Trump Administration insists that K-12 schools end alleged indoctrination of students with progressive ideologies. On Pg 319 of Project 2025, Mandate for Leadership, the Conservative Promise, a rationale is provided: “The Department of Education is a convenient one-stop shop for the woke education cartel” which “is not particularly concerned with children’s education” and is responsive to “leftist advocates intent on indoctrination”. This statement illustrates the power of conservative intent to reform K-12 education. In addition, the ED has rescinded Biden era policies on data collection methods by removing the “nonbinary” gender category from the Office of Civil Rights data collection authority, and the use of preferred pronouns.

In one of the administration’s executive orders they made the claim that “parents have witnessed schools indoctrinate their children …while deliberately blocking parental oversight.” and “students are forced to accept these ideologies without question or critical examination.” Support for LGBTQ+ people is one of the anti-American ideologies on which the Trump Administration is focusing. The executive order uses inaccurate and inflammatory rhetoric to describe ways schools currently may be supporting LGBTQ+ students. 

According to the order, gender identity is a “radical-anti-American ideology” that encourages students to “question whether to view their parents and their reality as enemies to be blamed.” Of course, schools are only trying to support LGBTQ+ and other marginalized students, as they would any student, but the Administration claims that merely addressing a student by their preferred name or gender can “undermine national unity”. 

The intent of that order is to disallow “gender ideology and discriminatory equity ideology” by threatening to withhold federal funds from schools that show support for students with gender identities that do not match their gender at birth. Also, the order warns that teachers may be prosecuted if they encourage a student’s transition, and claims that support of transgender students is “anti-American, subversive, harmful” and “a false ideology.” The administration is using the opportunity to stoke fear and outrage, by claiming that teachers have been known to “steer” students toward gender changing surgery without parental consent or involvement, although there is no evidence to support that outrageous claim. 

There are a wide range of laws and policies regarding the support of LGBTQ+ students in K-12 schools. “Some states have laws on the books that require K-12 instructional materials to include and represent LGBTQ+ people and identities.” Yet, other states and school systems within states have anti-LGBTQ+ policies. Policies protecting LGBTQ+ students from anti-LGBTQ+ bullying and harassment also vary widely among states and school districts 

The legal basis for supportive and unsupportive LGBTQ+ policies is far from settled because there are simply so many suits that are currently undecided. For example, the ED alleged that Northern Virginia school districts violated Title IX with supportive transgender policies related to the use of bathrooms and locker rooms. Currently, the ED is trying to withhold federal funds from those districts that won’t follow the federal order, and some of those districts are suing the ED for those funds. 

Flagrantly Ignoring Separation of Church and State

It is clear that Secretary McMahon plans to instill Christian values in public school classrooms, ignoring the principle of separation of church and state that is in the first amendment to the Constitution. Others in the administration are equally motivated, including Meg Kilgannon, currently the Director of Strategic Partnerships in the ED, who stated that “The most important thing we need to educate students about is God”. Certainly the intention and the anticipated success of the new school voucher tax credit program is to send students from public to Christian schools. 

A tenet of the Republican agenda is the belief that America is a Christian nation founded for its white Christian inhabitants and that our laws and policies must reflect this. Many agree with that belief: a recent survey revealed that 60% of Americans believe the founders of our country intended for the U.S. to be a Christian nation, and 45% believe ours should be a Christian nation today. Christian Nationalists deny the separation of church and state that was promised by our Constitution, and also they oppose equality for people of color, women, LGBTQ+ people, religious minorities, and the nonreligious. 

"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past." — George Orwell, 1984

Many aspects of the Project 2025 document visualize how the US should operate based on ideology of Christian nationalism. For example, the chapter on the Department of Health and Human Services points to a reform that would promote stable and flourishing married Families (pg 452). They state that the “conservative promise” calls for ending the alleged focus on LGBTQ+ and equity. Also it calls for an end to subsidizing single-motherhood, disincentivizing work, and penalizing marriage. The solution offered is that we should instead support only policies that support the formation of stable, married, nuclear families.

It appears that the Christian nationalism ideology embraced by the Trump administration will become used in our schools if the planned changes are allowed. There is no question that if Christian nationalism and its beliefs permeate our public schools it should be considered dangerous to our democratic form of government and it should be recognized that this would go against our Constitution. 

Spreading Trump-Approved History to Public Schools 

Secretary McMahon is visiting K-12 schools in all 50 states as part of the "History Rocks!" Tour. The stated goal of this tour is to foster "informed patriotism" by teaching founding principles, American history, and civic duties, emphasizing a "unifying and uplifting portrayal" of the nation. 

This tour is a kickoff of the “America 250 Civics Education Coalition”, a partnership of more than 40 conservative organizations including America First Policy Institute, Turning Point USA, the Heritage Foundation, Hillsdale College and other ultra conservative organizations. This group is chaired by the Fairfax GOP chair (and Moms for Liberty board member) Katie Gorka, which highlights the purely political nature of the coalition.

They are working to create programming on patriotism to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. All indications are that products from this collaboration will be used with recommendations from the 1776 commission to develop the Patriotic Education curricula ordered by the Trump administration. 

The so-called “patriotism” that President Trump is attempting to force-feed the country, and particularly our children, would lead to a vastly more ignorant society because it would diminish the history, values, and culture of a large percentage of Americans. Patriotism is learned and appreciated through historical knowledge of morally right and wrong actions, including how society’s characteristic spirit, guiding beliefs and fundamental values change over time. Americans should be outraged that the Trump Administration is pushing a brand of biased patriotism that disregards historical truth and punishes true patriots.

Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book has been rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street and building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And that process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped.  — George Orwell, 1984