Former second gentleman Doug Emhoff, talking at a rally in November, was among the many Biden appointees the Trump administration faraway from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum’s board of trustees.
Angela Weiss/AFP through Getty Photos
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Angela Weiss/AFP through Getty Photos
The Trump administration has fired no less than a few of former President Joe Biden’s appointees to the board that oversees the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, together with former second gentleman Doug Emhoff.
Emhoff, who’s married to former Vice President Kamala Harris, led the Biden administration’s efforts to fight antisemitism from his history-making vantage level as the primary Jewish partner of a U.S. president or vp.
He was certainly one of 12 folks Biden appointed in January to the US Holocaust Memorial Council, the board of trustees of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. Presidential appointees usually serve a five-year time period, in accordance with the museum’s web site.
On Tuesday, nevertheless, a number of Biden appointees had been notified of their abrupt termination from the board. The New York Instances, which first reported the firingsstated notices got here through electronic mail from the White Home Presidential Personnel Workplace. Tuesday was the eightieth anniversary of the liberation of Nazi Germany’s Dachau focus camp.
Emhoff confirmed and criticized his termination in an announcement on social mediathrough which he wrote that “Holocaust remembrance and training ought to by no means be politicized.”
“To show one of many worst atrocities in historical past right into a wedge subject is harmful — and it dishonors the reminiscence of six million Jews murdered by Nazis that this museum was created to protect,” wrote Emhoff, whose great-grandparents fled persecution from modern-day Poland within the early nineteenth century.
The White Home didn’t reply to questions on why — and what number of — board members had been terminated, however stated Trump plans to nominate new members.
In an announcement emailed to NPR, White Home press secretary Karoline Leavitt stated Trump “seems ahead to appointing new people who is not going to solely proceed to honor the reminiscence of those that perished within the Holocaust, however who’re additionally steadfast supporters of the State of Israel.”
The US Holocaust Memorial Council, which meets twice a 12 months, consists of 55 members appointed by the president, in addition to 5 members every from the Senate and Home of Representatives and three ex-officio members from the Departments of Schooling, Inside and State.
It isn’t clear what number of board members had been terminated on Tuesday. The New York Instances and Related Press report that different officers dismissed embody Ron Klain, Biden’s first chief of workers; Anthony Bernal, a senior advisor to former first girl Jill Biden; and Susan Rice, Biden’s former home coverage adviser and an architect of his nationwide technique for combating antisemitism.
Former Rep. David Cicilline, D-Rhode Island, whom Biden appointed to the board in 2024, confirmed to NPR that his place was additionally terminated. Cicilline — who left Congress in 2023 to run the Rhode Island Basis — known as firings “deeply disappointing” in an emailed assertion on Wednesday.
“The Museum’s work has at all times been nonpartisan and will stay so,” he stated. “It’s meant to problem us all to suppose critically and clearly about our position in society, to confront antisemitism, and all different types of hate.”
The US Holocaust Memorial Museum, which was established by Congress in 1980 and opened in 1993, is the nation’s official memorial to the Holocaust, devoted to the documentation, examine and interpretation of the genocide of European Jews throughout World Battle II.
It describes itself as an “unbiased institution of the US authorities working as a public-private partnership that receives some federal funding to assist operations of the Museum constructing.”
When requested in regards to the terminations, Andrew Hollinger, the museum’s communication director, advised NPR over electronic mail that the museum “is gratified that our visitation is strong and demand for Holocaust training is rising,” particularly given the rise in antisemitism and Holocaust denial or distortion.
“We look ahead to persevering with to advance our vitally essential mission as we work with the Trump Administration,” Hollinger wrote.
However some present and former board members, in addition to distinguished Jewish group leaders, say Trump’s terminations will threaten the establishment’s capability to hold out that mission.
“Donald Trump’s motion to prematurely take away members of the board earlier than the tip of their phrases is an try to politicize an establishment devoted to remembering one of many worst atrocities in our historical past and hurts our efforts to coach future generations,” Nevada Sen. Jacky Rosen, a Democrat who was appointed to the board in 2021, stated in an announcement shared with NPR.
Andrew Weinstein, who was appointed to the board by former President Barack Obama and served through the first Trump administration, stated on social media that “eradicating Biden appointees is petty and vindictive and distracts from this essential work.”
Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, requested for a “fulsome clarification for this choice and even a reconsideration.”
“Whereas it is true that the White Home has the privilege to nominate and dismiss members to such our bodies, the latter prerogative needs to be used with warning and solely in probably the most egregious conditions,” he wrote.
The Trump administration has focused a number of distinguished cultural establishments and their boards throughout his first few months in workplace.
In February, he purged the Biden-appointed members of the Kennedy Heart board and put in himself as its chair. In March, he issued a sweeping govt order aimed to get rid of “woke ideology” from the Smithsonian Establishment, singling out the American Artwork Museum, the Nationwide Museum of African American Historical past and Tradition, and the forthcoming American Girls’s Historical past Museum as examples.
On Monday, Trump tried to fireside three of the 5 board members of the Company for Public Broadcasting — which shortly sued him in response, arguing he doesn’t have the authority to take action.
Disclosure: NPR receives about 1% of its funds straight from the Company for Public Broadcasting, as defined right here.
