{"id":244156,"date":"2026-07-15T18:00:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T18:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/244156\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T18:00:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T18:00:07","slug":"government-installs-reworked-panels-about-slavery-in-philadelphia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/244156\/","title":{"rendered":"Government installs reworked panels about slavery in Philadelphia"},"content":{"rendered":"

By COREY WILLIAMS and TASSANEE VEJPONGSA<\/p>\n

PHILADELPHIA (AP) \u2014 The Trump administration followed through on its pledge to rework and then reinstall panels about slavery at the site of President George Washington\u2019s home in Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

Critics have warned that the new panels replacing the ones exhibited since 2010 whitewash the history of slavery. They were installed Wednesday morning in the same area where the Declaration of Independence was adopted on July 4, 1776.<\/p>\n

\u201cOvernight, under the cover of darkness, the federal government removed panels at the President\u2019s House that told a thorough history of Philadelphia,\u201d Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle L. Parker said Wednesday. \u201cIt was allowed to do this by the decision of the federal court, but that it did so at night shows it understands this action is shameful, that it violates community trust.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Visitors<\/p>\n

Visitors view the reinstalled educational panels about slavery at the site of President George Washington\u2019s home in Philadelphia, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo\/Tassanee Vejpongsa)\n<\/p>\n

\"Visitors<\/p>\n

Visitors view the reinstalled educational panels about slavery at the site of President George Washington\u2019s home in Philadelphia, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo\/Tassanee Vejpongsa)\n<\/p>\n

\"Visitors<\/p>\n

Visitors view the reinstalled educational panels about slavery at the site of President George Washington\u2019s home in Philadelphia, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo\/Tassanee Vejpongsa)\n<\/p>\n

\"Visitors<\/p>\n

Visitors view the reinstalled educational panels about slavery at the site of President George Washington\u2019s home in Philadelphia, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo\/Tassanee Vejpongsa)\n<\/p>\n

\"Visitors<\/p>\n

Visitors view the reinstalled educational panels about slavery at the site of President George Washington\u2019s home in Philadelphia, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo\/Tassanee Vejpongsa)\n<\/p>\n

Show Caption<\/p>\n

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Visitors view the reinstalled educational panels about slavery at the site of President George Washington\u2019s home in Philadelphia, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo\/Tassanee Vejpongsa)\n<\/p>\n

Expand<\/a><\/p>\n

The original panels were put in place in 2010 and told the story of how nine slaves lived in the home along with George and Martha Washington in the 1790s, when Philadelphia was briefly the nation\u2019s capital.<\/p>\n

Those panels were updated after President Donald Trump issued an\u00a0executive order<\/a>\u00a0in 2025 that called for federally owned or controlled historic sites to not display information to \u201cdisparage Americans past or living\u201d and to focus on the \u201cgreatness of the achievements and progress of the American people.\u201d<\/p>\n

A lower court forced the federal government\u00a0in February<\/a>\u00a0to remove the new panels after they already had been installed earlier this year. A three-judge panel of the U.S. 3rd Circuit of Appeals reversed that and\u00a0ruled July 3<\/a>\u00a0that the work could continue.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0government website<\/a>\u00a0with images of the new panels showed they would still have information on enslaved people who lived in the home. It would also include details on the abolitionist movement, how the Constitution treated slavery, the end of slavery in Pennsylvania and how Washington and his successor, John Adams, viewed and treated slavery, as well as information about the 20th century Civil Rights movement.<\/p>\n

However, the replacement panels do not include some of detail in the earlier ones, such as a map of slave trade routes and a timeline on slavery. They also avoid critical headlines such as \u201cThe Dirty Business of Slavery.\u201d<\/p>\n

The city of Philadelphia had sued the federal government over the removal of information previously included in the panels. It argued that the federal government must consult with the city before making changes to the President\u2019s House Site. Justice Department lawyers argued the administration alone can decide what stories are told at National Park Service properties.<\/p>\n

Parker said the city intends to seek a rehearing \u201con serious legal issues\u201d presented in the appeals court decision.<\/p>\n

Michael Coard, an attorney and founder of Avenging The Ancestors Coalition (ATAC), said the Philadelphia-based history preservation group continues to work on legal strategies opposing the Trump administration\u2019s changing of the panels.<\/p>\n

ATAC joined the city\u2019s lawsuit.<\/p>\n

Trump is attempting to rewrite history, Coard told reporters Wednesday near the site.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat if there\u2019s a president next time who doesn\u2019t like the Liberty Bell because the Liberty Bell was used by abolitionists to support the end of slavery?\u201d he said. \u201cWhat if there\u2019s a president who doesn\u2019t like the Statue of Liberty because too many immigrants come in? Do we remove the Statue of Liberty?\u201d<\/p>\n

The Associated Press left an email Wednesday seeking comment from the National Park Service.<\/p>\n

Williams reported from Detroit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By COREY WILLIAMS and TASSANEE VEJPONGSA PHILADELPHIA (AP) \u2014 The Trump administration followed through on its pledge to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":244157,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[104561,69,71,70,56140,49401],"class_list":["post-244156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-george-washington-slavery-exhibit","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news","tag-philadelphia-slavery-exhibit","tag-slavery-exhibit-removed"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244156\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}