Washington DC - President Donald Trump appears to have recently launched an effort to resurrect monuments to controversial historical figures that were torn down in the last few years. The problem is that he might not actually have the blanket power to do so.

On Thursday, Trump signed an order titled "Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History," which directed Smithsonian Museums and the National Zoo in DC to remove content that he has deemed "improper ideology."

The order also tasked Vice President JD Vance to work with Secretary of Interior Doug Burgum to "determine whether, since January 1, 2020, public monuments, memorials, statues, markers, or similar properties within the [Interior Department's] jurisdiction have been removed or changed to perpetuate a false reconstruction of American history, inappropriately minimize the value of certain historical events or figures, or include any other improper partisan ideology."

They will then "take action to reinstate" them.

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While Trump did not give examples as to what monuments they are considering, critics believe he was referencing statues of Confederate generals that have been torn down since the killing of George Floyd and the subsequent Black Lives Matter protests in 2020.

According to research from the Southern Poverty Law Center, more than 200 public Confederate symbols across the country were removed, relocated, or renamed within about a year and a half.

Seth Levi, the group's Chief Program Strategy Officer, told NPR on Friday that many of the removals did not take place on lands under the Interior Department's jurisdiction.

"Even for the objects that are on public land, it's normally land that's owned and controlled by municipalities or state governments. I'm not actually aware of any removals on National Park Service land," Levi explained.

"There have been removals on land that's controlled by the Department of Defense with the names of military bases, [but] it's unclear to us how many monuments have already been removed that this would actually apply to."

He continued, expressing his belief that the Trump administration is attempting to "minimize the fact that enslavement was a huge part of our history" and that minority contributions to US history "seem to be under threat."

According to data from SPLC, Confederate monuments and the addition of Confederate names to schools, roads, and other land sites proliferated during the Jim Crow period in America.