After ordering the effective dismantlement of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) last week, President Donald Trump has sworn in a new director for the agency who has pledged to “restore focus on patriotism,” alarming advocacy groups who fear a reduction of critical cultural services and restrictions on free expression.
Keith E. Sonderling, who was also sworn in as the United States Department of Labor’s Deputy Secretary, has assumed the role of acting director of the IMLS, the agency announced Thursday, March 20.
In a statement, Sonderling said he planned to uphold the Trump Administration’s vision to “preserve our country’s core values, promote American exceptionalism, and cultivate love of country in future generations.”
Sonderling, a labor and employment lawyer with no known experience in cultural institutions, replaces Cyndee Landrum, a seasoned official who worked in public libraries across the country for two decades and held the post at IMLS since March 2024.
Created in 1996 by the Museum and Library Services Act, the agency awarded $266 million to institutions nationwide last year. It once offered numerous museum grant programs, including the American Latino Museum Internship and Fellowship Initiative, Museum Grants for African American History and Culture, and Native American and Native Hawaiian Museum Services. The fates of those programs are unclear.
The IMLS has not yet responded to a request for comment.
Elizabeth Larison, director of the Arts and Culture Advocacy Program for the National Coalition Against Censorship, an alliance of nonprofits advocating for First Amendment rights, told Hyperallergic that Sonderling’s promise to promote American exceptionalism inhibits freedom of expression — including the freedom to criticize the government.
“It seems now that the IMLS will be putting education and culture in service of nationalist propaganda, rather than in service of the American people,” Larison said. “As a result, we are likely to see federal funding dry up for libraries and museums presenting materials that go against the beliefs and priorities of the current president, stifling the free exchange of ideas and cultural diversity in the US.”
Last week, Trump ordered the IMLS to eliminate all “functions and components” except those required by law, a similar tactic the president used this week to dismantle the Department of Education without Congressional approval in an executive order titled “Continuing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy.”
Sonderling’s commitment to utilizing the IMLS to promote “patriotism” is in line with actions associated with Trump’s plan for a “Golden Age in Arts and Culture,” announced on his social media platform Truth Social last month, which includes the elimination of drag shows at the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts. Trump replaced the center’s board with allies last month and installed himself as chair, prompting artists to withdraw from upcoming programming.
Earlier this week, Trump ousted the National Endowment for the Arts’s (NEA) first Native American chairperson, Shelly C. Lowe, pending Senate confirmation of a Trump-appointed replacement. Later this month, a federal judge will hear the American Civil Liberties Union’s case against the NEA, which the civil rights organization claims is violating First Amendment rights by enforcing Trump’s anti-trans mandate as a prerequisite for its grantmaking.
The move was met with swift condemnation from national cultural organizations including the American Alliance of Museums (AAM), the American Historical Association (AHA), and the American Library Association (ALA), all of which underscored the agency’s significant funding contributions to museums and libraries across the country.
“By eliminating the only federal agency dedicated to funding library services, the Trump administration’s executive order is cutting off at the knees the most beloved and trusted of American institutions and the staff and services they offer,” the ALA said in a statement.
The IMLS was one of seven to be effectively gutted by the executive order, including the United States Agency for Global Media (resulting in the shuttering of state-funded international broadcasting company Voice of America), Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in the Smithsonian Institution, and the Minority Business Development Agency. The Trump administration gave the agencies seven days to report their compliance to the Office of Management and Budget, the entity behind the funding freeze memorandum that sent chills throughout the network of organizations that depend on federal funding in January.
“This should be concerning for everyone in the US, regardless of their political leanings,” Larison said. “In a democracy, the role of libraries and museums is to serve the public by advancing access to information and culture in all its eclectic forms.”