April 7, 2025 Story by: Editor
The National Park Service has removed both an image and a quote from Harriet Tubman on its webpage about the “Underground Railroad,” marking another controversial change to federal websites under former President Donald Trump’s administration.
According to archived snapshots from the Wayback Machine, the webpage once opened with a tribute to Tubman — the most iconic conductor of the Underground Railroad — as recently as January 21. By March 19, both the image and the quote were gone, along with multiple references to “enslaved” individuals and the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.
The Washington Post was the first to report the changes. Currently, the page now begins with an image of commemorative civil rights stamps and includes phrasing such as “Black/White Cooperation.” Earlier versions of the page focused on the efforts of enslaved people to escape bondage and the broader context of the Underground Railroad in the wake of the Fugitive Slave Act. Now, however, the introduction emphasizes “American ideals of liberty and freedom” without explicitly referencing slavery.
Historians and academics have voiced concerns about the changes.
“Tubman’s removal from the ‘Underground Railroad’ page is both offensive and absurd,” said Fergus Bordewich, a historian and author of a book on the Underground Railroad, in an interview with CNN. He criticized the updated page as “diminished in value by its brevity.”
“To oversimplify history is to distort it,” Bordewich continued. “Americans are not infants: they can handle complex and challenging historical narratives. They do not need to be protected from the truth.”
Janell Hobson, a professor of women’s studies at the University at Albany, State University of New York, echoed those sentiments in an email to CNN. She described Tubman as “one of our greatest American heroes and definitely the greatest liberator in this nation.”
“I hope that the National Parks Service realizes they owe it to her and other heroes like her to stand in the truth of what this history has been,” Hobson added.
While the main Underground Railroad page was altered, another National Park Service page specifically dedicated to Harriet Tubman — highlighting her escape from slavery in Maryland, her relocation to Philadelphia, and her many return trips to guide others to freedom — remains unchanged as of January 28, 2025.
CNN has reached out to the National Park Service for comment on the revisions.
These changes are part of a broader trend within the Trump administration’s efforts to curtail diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. In February, public backlash followed the removal of terms such as “transgender” and “queer” from a National Park Service web page dedicated to the Stonewall Monument in New York City.
In a similar move, the Pentagon temporarily removed a webpage about Jackie Robinson — the groundbreaking athlete who broke the color barrier in modern Major League Baseball — before restoring it in March.
Even government pages on subjects not directly linked to DEI, including the Holocaust, sexual assault, and cancer awareness, have been quietly removed. Several defense officials told CNN that Pentagon staff were directed to search for keywords like “racism,” “ethnicity,” “LGBTQ,” “history,” and “first” to identify articles and photos for deletion.
Since beginning his second term, Trump has intensified efforts to reshape U.S. cultural and historical institutions. He has overhauled the board of trustees at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and issued an executive order in March targeting the Smithsonian Institution.
That order specifically called out the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the Smithsonian American Art Museum for featuring exhibits and language that Trump deemed inappropriate.
Source: CNN Edition
