The New Yorker: Politics And More

The term “culture wars” is most often associated with issues of sexuality, race, religion, and gender. But, as recent months have made plain, when Donald Trump refers to the culture wars, he also means the arts. He fired the board of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, which Republicans want to rename for him. His Administration fired the national archivist and the Librarian of Congress, and pressured the director of the National Portrait Gallery to resign; it is reviewing the entire Smithsonian Institution, looking for what the President calls “improper ideology.” Some view these moves as low-hanging fruit for Trump, and a distraction from bad press about Jeffrey Epstein, the Putin meeting, and tariffs. But Adam Gopnik believes that interpretation is a misreading. The loyalty purge at institutions such as the National Portrait Gallery is a key part of his agenda. “Pluralism is the key principle of a democratic culture,” Gopnik tells David Remnick. Could we be following the path of Stalinist R