President Donald Trump has dismissed the director of the Library of Congress, Carla Hayden, who was appointed by then-President Barack Obama in 2016. Hayden had a 10-year tenure that was set to end next year.
There was an email sent to Hayden by the White House deputy director of presidential personnel that referred to her and then went on to say, “On behalf of President Donald J. Trump, I am writing to inform you that your position as the Librarian of Congress is terminated effective immediately. Thank you for your service,” the Washington Post said.
Hayden, the first black woman to serve in the position, was the first career librarian to serve in the role in years, typically reserved for scholars or historians. Hayden has served as director of the Baltimore library system and as president of the American Library Association (ALA). She served in the position at the ALA from 2003 to 2004.
Hayden found herself surrounded by controversy after inviting Lizzo to play the crystal flute owned by James Madison as the performer twerked on stage.
Hayden has also lately been criticized for promoting left-leaning content by right-wing American Accountability Project (AAP) organization. As per Daily Mail, Hayden has criticized parents for not providing content to kids on sexual identity and she herself has contributed large sums to the Democrats.
Before she was fired, the AAP president, Tom Jones, told the outlet, “The President and his administration have made an admirable and overdue effort cleansing deep state liberals from the federal government. It is time they give Carla Hayden and Shira Perlmutter the boot and restore an America First agenda to the nation’s intellectual property rule.”
The group also tweeted recently, stating, “The current #LibrarianOfCongress Carla Hayden is woke, anti-Trump, and advocates trans-ing kids. It’s time to get her OUT and recruit a new guy for the position!”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) condemned the firing as a “disgrace.”
“Donald Trump’s unfair move to terminate Dr. Hayden by email from some arbitrary political hack is a shame and the latest in his continuous attempt to censor books, sanitize American history and turn back the clock,” Jeffries said.
When Hayden was grilled in 2016 confirmation hearings, Hayden stood up for leaving pornography filters off public library systems by asserting that doing so would limit patron’s access to health information, according to the Post.