The Richard Nixon Foundation is a not-for-profit organization based at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in

Yorba Linda, California Yorba Linda is a suburban city in northeastern Orange County, California, United States, approximately southeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is part of the Los Angeles metropolitan area, and had a population of 68,336 at the 2020 United States ...

. It was founded on January 24, 1983 by

Richard Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 until Resignation of Richard Nixon, his resignation in 1974. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican ...

, 37th

president of the United States The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president directs the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive branch of the Federal government of t ...

, and served as the governing body of the Nixon Library for nearly twenty years. Today it operates the Nixon Library in conjunction with the

National Archives and Records Administration The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an independent agency of the United States government within the executive branch, charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It is also task ...

, which is an entity of the federal government of the United States, in addition to undertaking charitable and education-based activities.

History

The Nixon Foundation founded, controlled and operated the Nixon Library from the library's dedication on July 19, 1990 until July 11, 2007, at which the Foundation invited the National Archives to take control. The two entities signed a joint operating agreement which allowed the library to become officially known as the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, welcoming it into the national system of presidential libraries. This move allowed President Nixon's White House documents to be moved to his library in Yorba Linda. The Nixon Foundation is governed by a board of directors, led by former National Security Advisor Robert C. O'Brien. The board includes President Nixon's daughters Tricia Nixon Cox and Julie Nixon Eisenhower, former U.S. Ambassador to Spain George Argyros, former California Governor

Pete Wilson Peter Barton Wilson (born August 23, 1933) is an American attorney and politician who served as governor of California from 1991 to 1999. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, Wilson previously served as a United S ...

, nationally-syndicated radio host and political commentator

Hugh Hewitt Hugh Hewitt (born February 22, 1956) is an American conservative political commentator, radio talk show host with the Salem Radio Network, attorney, academic, and author. He writes about law, society, politics, and media bias in the United States ...

, media pundit Monica Crowley, and longest-serving Vietnam War POW Everett Alvarez Jr. The Foundation's President and CEO is Jim Byron, a nonprofit executive appointed in 2021. The Foundation has hosted United States presidents, first ladies and several vice presidents. Also hosted have been public affairs commentators such as Bill O'Reilly, academics such as Doris Kearns Goodwin, and Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer. The library includes "Meet the Presidents," in which presidential impersonators speak to several hundred school-aged children. To commemorate the 10th anniversary of the

September 11, 2001 attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

, the Nixon Foundation brought 16 tons of warped steel from the World Trade Center and a damaged, first-responder FDNY firetruck to the Nixon Library for viewing. Before the National Archives took over its management, the Nixon Library had been accused by several media outlets of glossing over Nixon's 1974 resignation with "whitewashed" exhibits. In 2007, the National Archives removed the 17-year-old Watergate exhibit and, after three years, the new exhibit was scheduled to open in July 2010. The Nixon Foundation objected to the proposed exhibit, because the Nixon Foundation was not consulted in the way that other presidential foundations had been consulted with similar situations. The Foundation filed a 158-page memorandum to the Assistant Archivist for Presidential Libraries expressing their dissatisfaction and NARA stated a committee would review the objection but gave no timeline for when that process would be concluded. The exhibit opened on March 31, 2011.

Footnotes

External links

Official websiteRichard Nixon Foundation
at

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{{Authority control Richard Nixon 1983 establishments in Delaware