Since Trump took office thousands of government web pages have been taken down or modified, specifically those dealing with hate crimes, vaccines and charges against Jan 6 participants and other areas. Even mentions of the words “Black”, “women” and “discrimination” have been erased. (The action was eventually blocked by court order.)
“President Trump’s team is selectively stripping away the public record, reconstructing his preferred version of America”, according to the NY Times. “This is not a cost-cutting mechanism,” said Kenny Evans, who studies science and technology policy at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy and runs the White House Scientists Archive at the school. “This slide toward secrecy and lack of transparency is an erosion of democratic norms.”
The head of the National Archives – described as the ‘custodian of America’s collective memory’ – was fired in February and the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences was targeted for elimination, “to the maximum extent consistent with application law” – while its acting director planned to “restore its focus on patriotism”.
If this sounds to you like a George Orwell novel you’re not alone. “There are tectonic plates that are shifting, and it’s a new version of truth that is being portrayed, and that, I think, is the most profound danger we have ever faced as a country,” according to Lawrence Tribe, constitutional scholar and professor emeritus at Harvard University.