If you hadn’t heard, last year President Donald Trump signed an executive order titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” which directs federal agencies—including the National Park Service—to review and revise public-facing materials that are deemed to “inappropriately disparage” the United States, emphasizing patriotic narratives and the “progress of the American people.” In practice, the order has been used to flag and remove or reconsider interpretive signage and exhibits addressing uncomfortable aspects of our shared American history. In heavily trafficked areas of some parks, “snitch signs” with QR codes have even been placed that link to government forms where angry visitors can flag exhibits, ranger programs, or historical panels they find objectionable. (Ironically, most of the angry commenters have been from the other side, using the form to push back on the very idea of sign removal.)
Recent examples of this effort in practice include the dismantling of slavery-related exhibits at the President’s House site in Philadelphia tied to George Washington’s enslaved labor; reviews of panels at Independence National Historical Park and the Liberty Bell addressing systemic racism; and the January removal of descriptions of climate change driving glacial loss in Montana's Glacier National Park and signage at the Grand Canyon that acknowledged the displacement of Native Americans.
The most glaring example occurred this week at Stonewall National Monument in New York City. Designated in 2016, Stonewall is the first U.S. national monument dedicated to LGBTQ+ rights and history. It stands on the site of the 1969 riots that catalyzed the modern gay rights movement. For years, the rainbow Pride flag—a global symbol of resilience and identity—flew proudly on federal property there. However, recent policy shifts regarding which flags can fly on federal flagpoles led to its removal earlier this month.
Whatever the stated rationale—permitting, flagpole policy, “neutrality,” or “temporary” removal—the impact is the same: it signals that queer visibility at the birthplace of queer resistance is conditional. At Stonewall, symbolism is arguably the whole point. A Pride flag there isn’t partisan; it’s historically descriptive. Taking it down reads as an attempt to make the monument quieter, and therefore easier to ignore.
Stonewall is not an isolated flashpoint. Across the park system, signage and interpretive material are where the United States wrestles—sometimes clumsily, sometimes courageously—with reality: Indigenous dispossession, slavery and segregation, labor struggles, immigration, environmental decline, and the long fight for civil rights. That’s precisely why signage becomes a target. You can’t bulldoze Yosemite, but you can apparently erase the sentence that connects Yosemite to the Ahwahneechee, to federal removal policies, to conservation’s complicated legacy. You can’t un-designate Stonewall without a political fight, but you can make it feel unofficial by stripping a visible marker of recognition.