Why Are Americans So Hostile to State-Funded Art?

On May 23, the Trump administration requested that Congress close the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts, the premier government organizations for funding arts, scholarship, and culture in the United States. The NEH and the NEA, despite commanding a tiny fraction of the federal government's budget, have long been on the GOP's kill list, since conservatives consider them to be a complete waste of taxpayer money. The organizations responded with a level head. Instead of evangelizing for the arts and humanities as essential components of a nation of grandeur, an official for the NEH stated that “from Greenville, South Carolina, to Red Cloud, Nebraska, and beyond,” the organization has “inspired and preserved what is best in American culture.”