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Boston Globe
21 minutes ago
- Boston Globe
Smithsonian restores Trump to impeachment display in American history museum
The statement said that the interim sign, which had been in place from September 2021 until this July, was removed because it was not consistent with other sections of the exhibit and blocked the display case. 'We removed it to make way for a more permanent update to the content inside the case,' the Smithsonian said. The removal drew swift outcry from some members of the public as well as several Democratic leaders. The Smithsonian Institution has faced growing concerns about political interference at the education and research complex amid the Trump administration's efforts to exert more control over its work. Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer called the removal 'pathetic' during Senate floor remarks last week. 'You can't make this up,' he said. 'This is a man rewriting history - or thinking he can rewrite history. He can't, but he thinks he can.' Advertisement The Smithsonian said last week that no government official asked them to remove content from the exhibit. It also said that no other changes had been made at the museum. In a statement, Lindsey Halligan, a White House official charged with scrutinizing 'improper ideology' at the Smithsonian, reiterated that the White House wasn't involved with the revision. 'That said, it's encouraging to see the institution taking steps that align with President Trump's Executive Order to restore truth to American History. As part of that truth, it's important to note that President Trump was acquitted twice by Senate, fully and on every count - a fact that belongs in the historical record.' Some edits to the display's text are evident, including the addition of the word 'alleged' in the placard's description of the conduct that led to Trump's first impeachment. The display's main panel was also updated to reflect include Trump's name alongside Andrew Johnson, Richard M. Nixon and Bill Clinton. Of Trump's first impeachment, the impeachment display now reads: 'On December 18, 2019, the House impeached Donald Trump for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The charges focused on the president's alleged solicitation of foreign interference in the 2020 presidential election and defiance of Congressional subpoenas. Trump was acquitted in January 2020.' The temporary placard had read: 'On December 18, 2019, the House impeached Donald Trump for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The charges focused on the president's solicitation of foreign interference in the 2020 presidential election and his defiance of Congressional subpoenas. President Trump was acquitted in January 2020.' Advertisement Trump is the only president to have been impeached twice. In 2019, he was charged by the House with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress for his attempts to withhold military aid meant for Ukraine and pressure its government to investigate his political rival Biden. He was acquitted by the Senate in 2020. Then, just over a year later, Trump was impeached again, on a charge of incitement of insurrection following the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack. He was acquitted a second time, after leaving office. Of his second impeachment, the display reads: 'On January 13, 2021, Donald Trump became the first president to be impeached twice. The charge was incitement of insurrection based on his challenge of the 2020 election results and on his speech on January 6. Because Trump's term ended on January 20, he became the first former president tried by the Senate. He was acquitted on February 13, 2021.' The temporary placard had read: 'On January 13, 2021, Donald Trump became the first president to be impeached twice. The charge was incitement of insurrection, based on repeated 'false statements' challenging the 2020 election results and his January 6 speech that 'encouraged - and foreseeably resulted in - imminent lawless action at the Capitol.' Because Trump's term ended on January 20, his acquittal on February 13 made him the first former president tried by the Senate.' Since returning to the White House in January for his second term, Trump has attempted to exert influence over prominent cultural institutions, including by taking over the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, making drastic changes at the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities and imposing budget cuts on the National Park Service. Advertisement In March, Trump signed an executive order to eliminate 'divisive narratives' across the Smithsonian museums and 'restore the Smithsonian Institution to its rightful place as a symbol of inspiration and American greatness.' Months later, he attempted to fire Kim Sajet, the director of the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery, for being a 'highly partisan' person - though he had no authority to do so. The White House provided a list of 17 instances it said supported the president's claims about her, including the caption for the museum's presidential portrait of Trump mentioning his two impeachments and 'incitement of insurrection.' Early Friday afternoon in the 'American Presidency' exhibition, visitors milled about the display case. Some had been aware of the Trump text's removal. 'I heard it was taken out, and I came here to see it,' said Jodi Lindstrom, 49, visiting from Minneapolis. 'I don't think it's a good idea for the president to have a say over what is history. … You can't erase it. It's what happened. So I'm very happy to see it back in.' Following The Post's reporting about the change, the Smithsonian said it would restore Trump to the impeachment display 'in the coming weeks.' 'It does say four now,' said Ed Burk, 75, of Washington, D.C., leaning in to examine the display. But he wasn't satisfied by the alterations. 'Clinton gets a little more attention. Why not something as big for Donald Trump?' Mindy Kiser, 52, visiting from Wichita, had not previously heard about the exhibition's alterations. Advertisement 'It's disappointing to know that the museum may have caved to outside influences but also reassuring to know that they did the right thing and restored whatever they took away,' Kiser said. Her eyes lingered on the other items in the display case, and then the Trump text, displayed low with two small artifacts: admission to the Senate gallery for impeachment proceedings. 'The fact that he's been impeached twice, it does seem to be a little bit smaller, in my opinion,' she said. But 'in these days, we should just be happy that it's represented at all.'
WIRED
22 minutes ago
- WIRED
Truth Social's New AI Chatbot Is Donald Trump's Media Diet Incarnate
Aug 8, 2025 6:20 PM Truth Search AI appears to rely heavily on conservative outlet Fox News to answer even the most basic questions. New York, USA - January 24, 2014: Fox News Channel Truck parked on New York street, USA Photograph: Anouchka/Getty Images When I ask the new Truth Social AI chatbot about navigating bias in the media ecosystem, it gives what I view as pretty reasonable advice. 'Diversify your sources,' it responds. 'Rely on news outlets across the political spectrum, including those from both left-leaning and right-leaning perspectives.' This is advice that the AI itself may not be taking to heart. For instance, to come to the above answer it cites five sources, four of which are Fox News articles. The fifth, inexplicably, is a 400-page report from US health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr's Health and Human Services Department titled 'Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria.' Truth Social owner Trump Media & Technology Group launched the chatbot, called 'Truth Search AI,' on Wednesday. The bot is powered by Perplexity AI, a search engine that answers questions using large language models and live web search. The company has garnered investments from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and former Coinbase CTO and influential investor Balaji Srinivasan. In 2024, WIRED published an article detailing how Perplexity had been scraping parts of websites that developers did not want it to access, in violation of the widely accepted web standard known as the Robots Exclusion Protocol. It was also prone to making stuff up, a WIRED analysis showed. While Perplexity's AI draws from sources on the left and center, the Truth Search AI version never cited a center or left-leaning source in dozens of tests conducted by WIRED. In fact, the chatbot highlighted only seven sources in total in response to my queries—Fox News, Fox Business, The Washington Times, The Epoch Times, Breitbart, Newsmax and This was true even for innocuous, non-political questions. When I ask the bot 'What is 30 times 30?' It sourced its answer from a Fox Business article called 'Inflation Reduction Act estimated to induce mortality 30 times more than COVID.' Similar tests by Axios and the Verge also show this extreme bias towards conservative media. 'What you are noticing is one feature known as 'source selection,'' Perplexity representative Jesse Dwyer says when I ask about Truth Search AI exclusively pulling from conservative sources. 'Source selection can take any number of forms for any number of needs, from internal documentation within an organization, custom data sets, or, as in the case you describe, domain filtering. This is their choice for their audience, and we are committed to developer and consumer choice.' He adds that Perplexity 'does not discriminate against any developers for any political reasons,' and emphasizes that they 'do not claim their AI is 100 percent accurate.' The Truth Search AI seems to be in denial about its own apparent biases, however. 'Yes, I source information from left wing, centrist, and right wing news outlets depending on the nature of the user's query and what sources are returned in the search results,' it responds, when I ask it whether it ever uses sources from center or left wing outlets. 'My responses are designed to critically analyze and synthesize information from all credible perspectives to ensure accuracy and balance.' This answer is sourced from five Fox Business articles. (The AI seems to max out at five sources per response.) While chatbots never answer a question the same way twice, it consistently maintained the claim that it drew from sources across the political spectrum. Given its seemingly steady diet of Fox News, I'm a little surprised that the bot answers some questions as even-handedly as it does. It denies that the 2020 election was stolen, for instance, in direct opposition to president Donald Trump's claims. On foreign immigration to the US, it says that the overall effect is mixed, 'but tends towards positive,' and adds that deporting all unauthorized immigrants would lead to 'a loss of $133 billion over the next decade for Social Security, requiring tax increases to compensate.' I expect the bot to fawn over Trump, but it gives a relatively tepid review of his presidency thus far, describing 'sweeping executive action,' but negative approval ratings 'with particular voter discontent on the economy and inflation.' Some of these more liberal-leaning answers cite Associated Press articles that have been republished on the Fox News website. Trump Media and Technology Group did not respond to inquiries about the AI. But the limits of Truth Search AI's exclusively conservative source pool come into focus when I press it on Trump's well-documented connection to financier-pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. In spite of reporting to the contrary, it describes the connection as 'tenuous,' and says there is 'no credible evidence in the search results' that The Daily Beast published an article referencing a tape in which Jeffrey Epstein described Trump as 'his closest friend.' It's a different answer than the one given by Perplexity AI, which does locate and reference this article, using sourcing from the Daily Beast article itself, Yahoo News, Vox and the Yale Review. The sourcing for the Truth Search AI answer? Four articles from Fox News and one from Breitbart.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Pam Bondi was a regular on Fox News – but hasn't appeared since the Epstein files backlash started
Attorney General Pam Bondi hasn't appeared on Fox News since backlash to the Trump administration's handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files started. Bondi, once a regular on the cable giant, was last on-air as a guest with Sean Hannity on June 30, just days before the Justice Department and FBI dropped a bombshell memo about the Epstein case that ignited weeks of chaos, Mediaite first noted. The memo poured cold water on the theory that Epstein had a client list, concluded that he died in a New York jail cell by suicide, and said that no further documents in the case would be released to the public. It was the beginning of weeks of uproar over the administration's failure to release the full Epstein files despite making numerous promises to do so, and Bondi was in the middle of the MAGA firestorm. Fox News has largely followed President Donald Trump's lead and focused its attention on anything other than the controversy, which has dominated coverage at other outlets. Bondi has played a central role in the Epstein files saga. She told Fox News that the Epstein files were sitting on her desk back in February, but the comment came back to haunt her after the memo was released on the Fourth of July weekend. 'It's sitting on my desk right now to review,' Bondi told John Roberts in February, who asked if the Justice Department would release the list of clients. 'That's been a directive by President Trump.' Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy challenged Trump's press secretary Karoline Leavitt about Bondi's comment at a press conference in July, following the DOJ and FBI memo. 'So, what happened to the Epstein client list that the attorney general said she had on her desk?' Doocy asked Leavitt. 'Well, I think if you go back and look at what the attorney general said in that interview, which was on your network, on Fox News—' Leavitt said, before Doocy interrupted her to repeat Bondi's quote from February. Leavitt pushed back and said that Bondi was referring to 'the entirety of all of the paperwork, all of the paper in relation to Jeffrey Epstein's crimes.' Bondi also infuriated MAGA after she invited right-wing influencers to the White House and gave them 'Phase 1' binders. The binders contained information already in the public domain. Some of the headlines Fox has run about Bondi since have been less than favorable. 'Bondi under siege after DOJ reveals no Epstein client list,' a July 7 headline read, which again railed against the comment about the files being on her desk. The network also covered the reported feud between Bondi and Deputy Director Dan Bongino, headlined: 'Inside Dan Bongino's tense meeting with White House officials over Jeffrey Epstein fallout.' Despite some noise that he could walk over frustration with the Epstein case, Bongino remained in his role. Bondi briefly spoke with Fox correspondent David Spunt on July 18 during a tour of Alcatraz Island, but she did not appear as a guest as she has done many times previously. As Florida's Attorney General, Bondi was also the co-host of The Five and was a regular commentator for years.
