After the city of Philadelphia sued the Trump administration for the removal of slavery exhibits outside the historic President’s House, a federal judge has ruled in favor of the exhibit’s restoration. On Monday, Judge Cynthia M. Rufe ordered Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, the Department of the Interior, National Park Service Acting Director Jessica Bowron, and the National Park Service to reinstall the exhibits, citing that any further alterations must be accompanied by a “mutual written agreement” with the city.
“The government claims it alone has the power to erase, alter, remove, and hide historical accounts on taxpayer and local government-funded monuments within its control,” U.S. District Judge Cynthia Rufe wrote in her ruling, per Reuters. “Its claims in this regard echo Big Brother’s domain in [George] Orwell’s ‘1984.’”
“As if the Ministry of Truth in George Orwell’s 1984 now existed, with its motto ‘Ignorance is Strength,’ this Court is now asked to determine whether the federal government has the power it claims—to dissemble and disassemble historical truths when it has some domain over historical facts. It does not,” she added, continuing her comparison to George Orwell’s dystopian novel.
Last month, Philadelphia residents and visitors were shocked to see National Park Service employees removing a series of informational signs spotlighting Black history from the President’s House in Old City, Philadelphia. Following the removal of the historic site’s outdoor exhibits like “Freedom and Slavery in the Making of a New Nation,” “Life Under Slavery,” and “The Dirty Business of Slavery,” the city filed a federal lawsuit against Burgum and Bowron, citing that the exhibits were removed without proper notice to the city.
At the time, the slavery exhibits removal appeared to be in adherence to President Trump’s “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” executive order, which specifically called out the “improper ideology” at Philadelphia’s Independence National Historic Park, which includes the President’s House among other landmarks and the National Smithsonian museums.
Though Judge Rufe noted the “irreparable harm” of erasing history, calling the removal “arbitrary and capricious,” she did not offer a timeline on the court-ordered restoration. Meanwhile, community leaders are celebrating the significance of this ruling.
“Donald Trump and JD Vance have attempted time and again to whitewash our history, and their bigotry was on full display as they ordered the defacement of the President’s House display which told the stories of the Black Americans who were enslaved there,” Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta wrote on X. “But Philadelphians fought back, and I could not be more proud of how we stood together.”
Similarly, Michael Coard, an attorney and founder of Avenging the Ancestors Coalition, which joined the city of Philadelphia’s federal lawsuit, told WHYY News: “This judge, a Republican, by the way, looked at the law, looked at the facts, and did the right thing. This happened on Presidents’ Day. To me, it’s like the judicial equivalent of the Revolutionary War where the Founding Fathers took up arms against a dictatorial government in Britain. Well, this judge took up a pen against a dictatorial government here in 2026.”
“This ruling is important because it affirms that no administration has the right to sanitize or whitewash our history for its political goals. And while the decision is a necessary and welcome corrective, we cannot ignore the broader wave of censorship targeting Black and Native history in classrooms, museums, and public spaces, especially as the country’s 250th anniversary approaches,” Trevor Smith, Executive Director of BLIS (Black Liberation-Indigenous Sovereignty) Collective, told theGrio. “Let this be a reminder that no one is above the Constitution, and that attempts to erase our histories will be met with resistance, truth-telling, and collective power, as members of the BLIS Collective are proving every day.”
