970x125
Late last week, the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) overhauled its website’s home page. The change took place sometime between Wednesday, February 25, and Friday, February 27. The refresh is the perfect encapsulation of how the Trump Vance administration is hellbent on destroying an agency dedicated to sharing and protecting truth, facts, and information; it is also the perfect encapsulation of how the regime’s obsession with and dedication to AI is about bowing to technocrats and further enshittifying democracy, rather than serving the American citizenry.
The IMLS is the only federal agency dedicated to public museums and libraries in the United States. The current administration has besieged it, to include everything from mass staff cuts–the agency’s 98 staff members were reduced to 40–to withholding grants to both states and individuals, groups, and agencies that applied and were selected for them. The Trump Vance regime’s cuts to the IMLS have resulted in two lawsuits, Rhode Island v. Trump and ALA v. Sonderling; the first dealt a decisive loss to the administration and has been recently appealed, while the second continues to extend its timeline for any decision (though some signs suggest a settlement may be on the way).
Sworn in as Acting Director of IMLS last March, Keith Sonderling’s term of service came to an end 210 days later, per the federal Vacancies Act. His Acting status was intended to give Trump time to appoint a permanent leader. As of writing, no leader has been nominated, and Sonderling–despite not being the Acting Director anymore–continues to act as though that is his position. No one in the current regime has interceded, nor have they brought any candidates up for the Director role.
IMLS is an arm of propaganda for the Trump-Vance regime. This was evident in the takeover of the agency’s social media, and it continues today, not only in its outlandish, misinformed takes on the agency’s role but also through a current project dubbed the Freedom Trucks. The IMLS Freedom Trucks stole over $14,000,000 from U.S. taxpayers, intended to serve public libraries and museums, and funneled it directly into the pockets of the right-wing private corporation PragerU. IMLS staff, experts in libraries and museums, had no say in the development of the Freedom Trucks, which the regime claims celebrate America’s shared cultural history in honor of the country’s 250th anniversary. Instead, those Freedom Trucks were developed entirely by PragerU and associates, private interests with a history and philosophy of whitewashing history.
Despite claims that the $14,000,000 Freedom Trucks were going to criss-cross the nation, they’re not. The schedule of events for the America250 celebratory trucks doesn’t include any “blue” states.
Literary Activism
News you can use plus tips and tools for the fight against censorship and other bookish activism!
It is infuriating to see that states with lower literacy levels, where schools have become the most targeted by partisan politics (past and present), where books and texts filled with facts and history have been yanked off the shelves “to protect the kids,” and where money is being stolen from public schools to fund the private education of the already-wealthy are the ones getting the “treat” of Freedom Trucks. These Trucks further lie to some of the most vulnerable about this country’s history and further the propaganda that the regime hopes they’ll continue to swallow down without question. Too many of those who will hop aboard the trucks lack the critical literacy skills (of all kinds) to ask questions. Most genuinely want to be “good Americans,” but they’re being sold a lie of what that has meant in the past, the present, and the future. In some cases, they’ll encounter these propaganda trucks devoid of context, such as at the Texas State Fair, further allowing the imagined narrative to stand as fact rather than fantasy.
That is, of course, intentional.
Over the last couple of months, some good news has flowed from the IMLS. At least it looks like good news on the surface. Notice of Funding Opportunities were prefaced by the kinds of projects the IMLS would be eager to fund. Where the actual role of the IMLS is to fund projects based on merit, the Trump Vance regime made clear that the purpose of its IMLS would be to fund projects that further the administration’s agenda.
Among the most prized projects? Those that center on Artificial Intelligence, particularly regarding where and how librarians are educated and how they work in the field. We know that several states and regions have banned library workers from being involved with the American Library Association (ALA), and this is one more way in which the profession is being deprofessionalized–ALA acts as the accrediting body for most of the master’s programs for future librarians.
The IMLS is also serving as one of the agencies advancing administrative priorities around advancing AI in education. The agency recently announced that over four million dollars of the IMLS’s budget–which, as of the just-passed FY 2026 budget, is only about $292 million–would be directed to eight projects aligned with Trump’s 2025 Executive Order, “Advancing Artificial Intelligence Education for American Youth,” and those which advance the Trump Administration’s 2025 AI strategy blueprint “Winning the Race: America’s AI Action Plan. Again, this is the agency setting priorities for funding based on the administration’s desires; it is not, as it should be, the agency funding projects developed from those working in libraries and museums who serve a wide range of communities nationwide.
So that the IMLS home page got a fresh new look just weeks after the agency was moved from its previous home to the Department of Labor building and that the website is now AI slop only makes sense.
First: note the language being used. The IMLS isn’t here to advance the whole landscape of America. It’s here to focus on where “cultural competitiveness” can advance in the next 250 years. What those words mean is anyone’s guess–AI can generate some things that sound nice but are ultimately meaningless. But the longer you think about the exact phrasing within the context of everything that happened under the Trump-Pence regime and the Trump-Vance regime now, the meaning is clear. This is about elevating a narrative of superiority and one that furthers the administration’s desires. There will be fewer stories of those who don’t fit into the imagined box painted by those in power as the ideal American. The “ideal American,” as we’ve seen in this administration via their numerous department social media channels, is a lot of AI slop centering white people (plus a lot of Norman Rockwell, intended to evoke nostalgia for a non-existent time in America).
Perhaps the meaningless language isn’t enough to convince that the new home page is just AI. In that case, maybe the calendar image on the home page will help.
America’s calendars now have eight days a week. That’s not even touching the mangled American flag and the random splattering of stars around it.
“Cultural competitiveness” indeed.
It’s an embarrassing look foisted upon a tiny agency, and it’s an embarrassing look for a country that insists it prides itself on all that it can do and offer. This is the level of competitiveness the Trump-Vance regime wants in AI compared to our international peers. It’s as shameful as it is exhausting.
As of Monday morning, March 2, it appears that the regime overseeing the IMLS caught the AI slop calendar. The image has since been replaced with another picture of a Freedom Truck, with Keith Sonderling and several other men standing in the foreground. To be clear, that’s the kind of work a human had to go back in and fix. So much for AI saving time.
Nothing about this new homepage highlights libraries, museums, or the incredible range of people doing work in both. You can’t even find deadlines for grant applications.
It’s a lot of early American art centering white men, alongside propaganda trucks and their propagandists.
So What Can Be Done?
For a year, I’ve covered the downs and ups of the IMLS under the authoritarian regime. Included in every update have been concrete actions that anyone who cares about the future of democracy, this agency, libraries, and facts can take. What you’ll see here won’t be dramatically different, because these steps still matter. These suggestions include insight from former IMLS employees, who have seen what’s happening from the inside. It is not the IMLS staff who are responsible for the agency’s new role as a propaganda machine. The staff is watching as their hard work and their championing of public libraries and museums is being erased by an authoritarian regime and by AI.
- Tell people what’s happening. I‘ve kept a running timeline of what’s happened at the IMLS since last March. It includes updates on the FY 2026 budget and both court cases seeking to halt further damage to the agency. There are also nearly two dozen pages’ worth of links to stories about the impact of IMLS’s changes and cuts to libraries across the country. When things have shifted or changed, a note has been made. As of January this year, it has become clear that there is very little media paying attention to the IMLS, let alone asking questions or raising concerns about the press releases spun by that agency. It’s symbolic of where and how our media ecosystem is broken. Under an authoritarian regime, every piece of government news needs to be read critically and presented within the context of the bigger picture. Instead, outlets across the country have simply posted that the Freedom Trucks are coming and isn’t that so cool.
- On that note, think about where and how you can increase your own engagement with the IMLS situation right now and make an impact with your own networks. An example is showing up to IMLS events, such as the Freedom Trucks events, and documenting what’s happening. This is, of course, challenging given where these Trucks will be showing up, but if you can, go. Highlight the inaccuracies. Explain who or what is missing. Pass this along to the decision makers, too–your representatives should know where your tax money is being inappropriately used, especially if they want to keep their jobs come the next election season.
- Contact your federal representatives. It doesn’t matter if they’re republican or democrat. They need to be paying attention to the degradation of our democratic institutions. Not only do you talk about the importance of an IMLS that isn’t a tool of the regime, you should do so in a way that makes it clear you’re watching where and how your representatives respond and that that will impact your future votes. The current “Acting Director” of the IMLS, Keith Sonderling, isn’t legally the acting director anymore and no one has been proposed for the role is something to bring up. Ask why this is. Ask why the regime is getting away with breaking federal law and policy over this. Ask who is overseeing this. Ask why decisions are being made that actively harm and denigrate the work being done by civilian IMLS employees by an individual who isn’t in the role that he’s pretending to be in. Continue to advocate for the agency’s funding, despite the regime’s actions. Demand oversight.
- If you’re anywhere within the library, museum, or educational world, continue to keep your professional organizations abreast of what’s going on. Ensure that advocacy arms of these professional systems continue to speak up and out about what’s happening–ask them to continue sharing calls to action and updates. Think not just of the national-level professional organizations. Consider your state, regional, and local organizations, too, as they are just as impacted as those on the broader scale.
- Continue patience and understanding of the overstrained, under-resourced civilian employees of the IMLS. They don’t want to be doing this, but they also need to pay their bills, take care of their health, and make a living. It’s the worst of a bad situation. Share the calls for funding, and do so with reiteration that staff may not be the ones making decisions–that their hands are likely tied due to being under an authoritarian regime. We need the IMLS staff to feel supported so they can continue to do their job as much as possible from the inside–if they leave, they will either not be replaced at all, or they’ll be replaced with more from the administration’s pool of candidates. Either case is a win for the Trump-Vance regime.
It’s worth ending this continued look at the current state of the IMLS with this: projects are being funded, and many of those projects are focused on the topics and interests of the whole of America. This includes projects with “DEI” and “gender” components, as well as projects that benefit the kinds of libraries that the regime would otherwise target. It may be cold comfort, especially in the face of such monumental challenges and roadblocks. However, good people on the ground are still doing good work–and if anything, we’ve learned that good people will continue to do good work when everything is up against them. That’s because good work matters. Good work makes it into the history books, even when those history books become targets of censorship and erasure. We carry the truth within us, and no amount of silencing or removal changes the fact that we know it, and we’ve been documenting it thoroughly.
Hope is an action that depends upon us.
