You Won’t Believe How Trump Just Described Watergate

Watergate, and Nixon’s forced resignation in the face of certain impeachment, resulted in the end of his political career. But in the last several months, Trump has taken some concrete steps to rewrite his own impeachment history.

Trump is the only U.S. president to be impeached twice, in 2019 and 2021. In August, the Smithsonian removed Trump from its exhibit on impeachments under direct pressure from the White House, in the wake of an art director’s ousting. That left the exhibit focusing on Presidents Nixon, Andrew Johnson, and Bill Clinton, effectively returning the exhibit to the way it looked in 2008. The “American Presidency” wing’s revised signage explained that “only three presidents have seriously faced removal” over the course of American history. The change was the result of a White House–initiated content review.

The Smithsonian has since re-added Trump to the impeachment exhibit, but with some changes to how the proceedings against him are described, most notably regarding his actions during the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.