White House bid to cut funding could spell trouble for Smithsonian American Latino museum

WASHINGTON — Backers of a new museum honoring American Latinos are hoping it can withstand a budgetary strike from the White House, despite fears it could become a casualty in Donald Trump’s culture war.

The president’s vision for the Smithsonian Institution includes slashing its federal funding by 12% overall and zeroing out money for the nascent Latino museum, according to budget documents released last week.

Until now, the fate of the Latino museum had been traveling on a parallel track to a new museum of women’s history.

“It is important that not only as the women’s museum goes forward, so does the Latino museum. That was the intent,” said Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., a co-sponsor of a recent bill that would clear the way for construction of the Latino museum on the National Mall. “That was the bipartisan agreement to move the museums forward together. But this administration, for whatever reason, has decided that only one of them should move forward.”

New York Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, who has led the House bills to allow both museums to be built in the highly coveted mall zone, called the proposed cut “disappointing” and said she’d like to see funding continued.

“But I’ve been so focused on the women’s museum. That’s been my priority. Maybe we need to do one museum at a time,” Malliotakis said Wednesday.

The National Museum of the American Latino and the American Women’s History Museum were authorized as part of an appropriations package signed by President Donald Trump in 2020 and were to be built half with private donations and half with public funds.

While Trump publicly threw his weight behind the women’s museum effort earlier this year, he has made no such endorsement of the Latino museum. And he has taken aim at content across the Smithsonian, issuing an executive order aimed at rooting out “divisive, race-centered ideology” and attempting to fire the director of the National Portrait Gallery, claiming an authority it’s not clear he has.

A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday. The Smithsonian, through a spokesperson, declined to comment. But a budget justification from the institution, which operates 17 museums in D.C., notes the lack of funding for the development of the Latino museum.

“Instead, the request returns the Smithsonian to the integrated approach previously used to share the collections throughout the Institution that chronicle American Latino history and culture,” the fiscal 2026 document states. “That approach was led by the Smithsonian Latino Center (SLC), which promoted the Latino presence within the Smithsonian’s collections, programs, and educational content.”

The president’s proposed budget would provide the Smithsonian Latino Center $5.8 million, according to the document. But sharing collections across existing Smithsonians is a far cry from establishing a stand-alone museum.

Xavier Becerra, the former secretary of Health and Human Services who introduced a bill in 2003 that laid the groundwork for the museum when he was a member of the U.S. House, said such an approach doesn’t reflect and honor the many historical contributions of Latino Americans.

“My sense is that most people will tell you that they’ve never heard of the center, and you’d have to work really hard to find where within the Smithsonian network you could actually see your own history if you’re Latino,” said Becerra, who is running for governor in California.

Becerra called the proposed funding cut a “major step backward … especially at a time when this country is going through major convulsions and so many people in the Latino community are wondering what our place is in this country and how we are viewed.”

CiCi Rojas, chair of the Friends of the National Museum of the American Latino, an advocacy and fundraising group, said she isn’t deterred by the potential cut, in part because she believes there’s strong bipartisan support for the museum.

“I don’t know that we’re that alarmed by this,” Rojas said. “We’re going to remain positive that we can get this done.”

The White House budget document is not the final say. In the coming weeks and months, House and Senate appropriators will hammer out spending details for the coming fiscal year.

But it’s a potentially disruptive development for a museum that proponents believed had been gaining bipartisan momentum after several rocky years, including a period when critics balked at a preview exhibit they said advanced a progressive narrative.

Florida Republican Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart came out strongly against it as part of a push in 2023 to defund the museum. But the naysayers ultimately came around, and Díaz-Balart, a member of the House Appropriations Committee, said he feels his concerns were addressed.

“I think the message was sent very clearly. I’m satisfied,” he said on Wednesday.

But Díaz-Balart, along with fellow Florida Republican Rep. Carlos Giménez, stopped short of throwing their full support behind the project.

“I consider the museum something which I’d like to have, but it’s not something I gotta have,” said Giménez, who sits on the Smithsonian Board of Regents alongside Cortez Masto and a few other lawmakers.

Meanwhile, outside groups have continued to agitate against it. Alfonso Aguilar, director of Hispanic engagement at the American Principles Project, said the museum is being used to promote a “woke, culturally Marxist agenda.”

“Any Republican who supports this museum … is going to have to respond to it to their constituents, because they can’t say that they’re conservative, that they’re Republican, and support a travesty like this,” Aguilar said.

Still, some in Congress are projecting cautious optimism. “I think we have a great opportunity in the appropriations process to bring the funding back to the table,” said Rep. Adriano Espaillat, D-N.Y., chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and a House appropriator. “I will fight to make sure that it is brought back.”

Espaillat, however, said the zeroed-out funding could complicate the museum’s future and next steps. Advocates have been waiting on Congress to pass the legislation that would allow further planning and construction to begin on the National Mall.

The House version of the Latino museum siting bill, led by Malliotakis, had 71 co-sponsors as of Wednesday, including 35 Republicans.

In the Senate, a companion bill, led by California Democrat Alex Padilla, notched support from Republicans Ted Cruz of Texas and Bernie Moreno of Ohio.

Cruz this week said he wasn’t familiar with the White House’s desire to strike funding for the Latino museum. But he reiterated his support for the project.

“I believe we will see the Smithsonian Latino Museum built and that it will open on the National Mall where it should be,” Cruz said. “I’ve long been a supporter of it and continue to be.”

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