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Since taking office in January 2025, President Donald Trump has launched an all-out assault on the nation鈥檚 past. He has cut funding and signed executive orders targeting historical programming at public institutions, including national parks, museums, and public schools, to silence or obscure the histories of communities of color and the systemic inequalities and racism those communities have endured since European settlers landed in what would later become the United States.

Now, some history advocacy organizations are leaning into community-based education programs to continue teaching a more diverse and comprehensive picture of the nation鈥檚 past. 

鈥淓ducation doesn鈥檛 have to be within school buildings. We need to have outside activities that provide the teachings of Black history. I think that鈥檚 crucial,鈥� says Kristi Williams, founder of , an organization offering free Black history classes to community members of all ages in Tulsa, Oklahoma. 鈥淲hether they be in our churches, whether they be on the sidewalks, or in different spaces, we have to create those spaces.鈥�

The need for community-led spaces has become increasingly apparent over the past few months as the Trump administration has sought to stifle cultural institutions dedicated to preserving the histories of communities of color while promoting its white supremacist political agenda. In March 2025, the White House to 鈥淩estore Truth and Sanity to American Education,鈥� which targeted the Smithsonian鈥檚 National Museum of African American History and Culture. While the is to capture and share 鈥渢he unvarnished truth of African American history and culture,鈥� Trump鈥檚 executive order labeled its work 鈥渄ivisive鈥� and 鈥渁nti-American.鈥�

Following the executive order, the National Park Service (NPS) reportedly from its exhibits about the great abolitionist Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. That network of secret routes and safe houses for freedom seekers escaping to the Northern U.S. in the late-18th and 19th centuries and Tubman, the network鈥檚 most famous 鈥渃onductor,鈥� have become symbols of resistance to enslavement. On its site, NPS replaced a large photo of Tubman with images of postage stamps highlighting 鈥淏lack/white cooperation.鈥� It later walked back the changes after public outrage.聽

Around the same time, NPS removed the in Socorro, Texas, the most recently designated Latinx National Historic Landmark, from its site. That landmark honors the contributions of Braceros, millions of guest workers from Mexico who came to the U.S. to mitigate farm labor shortages beginning during World War II. 

Experts warn that the Trump administration鈥檚 actions will also affect future preservation activities and education programming, threatening to reverse a decade-long toward expanding the nation鈥檚 preservation system to include more sites and stories representing the nation鈥檚 communities of color.聽

鈥淭his executive order, which restricts federal funding for projects addressing systemic inequality, directly assaults the truth of our nation鈥檚 history,鈥� says Sehila Mota Casper, executive director of (LHC), the leading nonprofit organization working to preserve Latinx places in the United States. 鈥淏y limiting funding and erasing Latinx narratives, it silences millions and jeopardizes the preservation of crucial histories.鈥� 

The administration鈥檚 actions follow similar efforts made during Trump鈥檚 first term, when he issued a that sought to ban what he called 鈥渄ivisive concepts鈥� about race from federal institutions. In 2020, Trump also created the 1776 Commission, which aimed to promote 鈥減atriotic education,鈥� a whitewashed version of the nation鈥檚 past that obscures systemic racism. He this year in a January 2025 executive order.

The actions also mirror state-level efforts in recent years. Nationwide, more than 20 states have or already have legislation in place restricting the teaching of race and the histories of America鈥檚 communities of color. While Republican-led states have been at the forefront of this regressive movement, many Democratic-led states have also moved similar legislation forward. have begun debating legislation that would limit how schools can teach students about race, according to an analysis from EdWeek.

Williams launched Black History Saturdays in response to Oklahoma鈥檚 House Bill 1775, which was signed into law in 2021 and and is meant to restrict discussion of race and power in the classroom. Among the prohibited classroom content is anything that could cause students to 鈥渇eel discomfort, guilt, [or] anguish.鈥澛�

鈥淏ut history is uncomfortable,鈥� says Williams. 鈥淓specially when you have been the aggressor in history and you don鈥檛 want to come out looking like the bad person. But the thing is, we are still operating under the same system that protected slavery, and when students learn that, they鈥檙e going to want to change it.鈥�

Historians, educators, and that undermining efforts to enact systemic change could be the purpose of Trump鈥檚 attacks on historical truth. Restricting education on race helps prevent Americans from developing an understanding of racism, how it has been maintained, and how it continues to function through the nation鈥檚 and , . The status quo serves figures such as those in Trump鈥檚 administration, who have accumulated wealth and power thanks to the nation鈥檚 systematized inequities; they are invested in continuing it. Similarly, that Trump鈥檚 agenda appeals especially to white, Christian, and male voters who are concerned about threats to their status. 

Williams says that while the federal government鈥檚 agenda and its reasoning are part of a grim trend, the recent crackdown has also 鈥渃reated the right time for us to organize and learn how we can protect our histories.鈥� Black History Saturdays and LHC remain committed to teaching about racism and uplifting the histories of communities of color through their community-based education programs. 

Black History Saturdays gives students of all backgrounds and ages in Tulsa a chance to learn about the historical struggles and contributions of African Americans at day-long monthly convenings in a repurposed schoolhouse. When Williams launched the program in 2023, it served 120 students. Now, , there are nearly 400 regular attendees. The group is divided into eight classes sorted by age. The youngest participants are preschoolers, and the adult classes include a 90-year-old attendee. The program also offers free breakfast and lunch to participants, where a chef 鈥渢eaches Black history through his food,鈥� says Williams. 

Meanwhile, LHC, a nationwide organization, offers online workshops to community groups and educators to help them lead Latinx historic preservation and education efforts in their communities. These workshops are based on LHC-designed curricula, and the organization offers a downloadable, which provides step-by-step guidance on historic designation processes to equip communities with the knowledge to lead preservation efforts.

To hold the federal government accountable, LHC also of its Equity Study in April 2025. That study examines how and why Latinx heritage sites are underrepresented in official efforts to recognize and preserve historic sites. It also calls for increasing funding and attention to such work to counter the Trump administration鈥檚 regressive approach. Williams says she sees community-of-color-led efforts like these as 鈥減art of a national movement to reclaim education, memory, and power.鈥�

For historian Ida Jones, author of Mary McLeod Bethune in Washington, D.C.: Education and Activism in Logan Circle, community-led programs focused on Black or Latinx histories follow in the tradition of earlier educators of color who taught in their communities when the government failed or refused to do so. She draws a line back to the late-19th and early-20th centuries, when a generation of Black Americans whose parents had endured enslavement began exploring their identities as African Americans. Education was an essential .

, a teacher and civil rights activist, and Carter G. Woodson, a historian and , were two of the movement鈥檚 most prominent leaders. 鈥淲hat Bethune did, what Woodson did, was create a curriculum to teach the African American community, who didn鈥檛 know their history,鈥� Jones explains. Importantly, this generation of educators, who Jones says stood 鈥渙n the cusp of enslavement and freedom, of property and citizenship,鈥� integrated their ancestors鈥� African pasts, their experiences of enslavement and racism, and the ways they had endured and won their freedom, into a uniquely African American narrative. They were 鈥渂uilding this case for their humanity at the same time in which they were trying to embrace their citizenship,鈥� says Jones.

While the Trump administration tries to paint Black histories and the histories of other communities of color as 鈥渁nti-American,鈥� Jones says teaching these histories has always been a deeply American project. In Bethune and Woodson鈥檚 time, Jones says, 鈥淭hey sought to be patriots of the country in which they now lived and be integrated into the fabric or the tapestry of that narrative. African Americans never sought to stand opposed or outside of the conversation of American history and culture. They saw themselves and their children as citizens, as patriots, as residents, and Americans.鈥�

Williams also takes inspiration from the , a series of about 2,500 schools mainly located in the U.S. South that offered summer programs to Black students of all ages. Those programs were meant to supplement the substandard education that many Black students received during the Jim Crow era, and helped the community improve its social, political, and economic status. 

Asami Robledo-Allen Yamamoto, director of education and outreach at LHC, says her organization is also taking cues from the past in its opposition to Trump鈥檚 attacks. 鈥淲hen you look at the history of education, we鈥檝e been here before,鈥� she says. 鈥漇o, we鈥檙e going to get through this, and we鈥檙e going to get through it through acts of resistance, like staying our course, and providing tools, and supporting educators.鈥�