Donald Trump fires national archivist

The White House announced Friday evening that President Trump has fired Colleen Shogan from her position as Archivist of the United States.

White House Director of Presidential Personnel Sergio Gor shared the news on X: “At the direction of @realDonaldTrump, the Archivist of the United States has been dismissed tonight. We thank Colleen Shogan for her service.”

According to a source cited by CNN, while Shogan knew Trump wanted to replace her, she was caught off guard by how quickly it happened. Shogan, who President Biden chose for the job in 2022, made history as the first woman to lead the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). Before this role, she worked as a senior vice president at the White House Historical Association.

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The National Archives has become more prominent lately, especially after the FBI searched Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in 2022 looking for classified documents. Shogan, who started as Archivist in 2023, wasn’t working at the Archives when this search happened. At that time, the Archives had asked the Justice Department to look into how Trump handled White House records.

Trump has previously openly criticised the National Archives. In an interview with radio host Hugh Hewitt, he called the previous archivist, David Ferriero, “a disaster.” During that same interview, Trump hinted at his plans to replace Shogan, saying “I think I can tell you that we will get somebody. Let me just put it – yeah, we will have a new archivist.”