USA National Archives Access to be Restricted

The National Archives announced that as of 7 July 2025, access will be restricted to “visitors with a legitimate business need” and “It will no longer be open to the general public.”

The complete notice on the NARA website said:

Effective July 7, 2025, the National Archives at College Park, MD, will become a restricted-access federal facility with access only for visitors with a legitimate business need. It will no longer be open to the general public. Security officers will enforce these restrictions, and your cooperation is appreciated.

After this provoked public outcry, on 24 June NARA took the notice off its website. On 25 June, NARA posted as follows on X (formerly Twitter):

We caused a misunderstanding yesterday in the way we communicated long overdue enhanced security standards that are going into effect at the National Archives at College Park, M.D.

First things first: For those who want to come to College Park and look through the records, the research rooms were, are and will ALWAYS remain open to the public. Ensuring public access to records in the archives is part of NARA’s core mission and the new security standards do not – and would never- change this.

The National Archives is implementing long overdue enhanced security standards at College Park due to several recent incidents that have left those in the building-including researchers- and our nation’s records vulnerable to threats. In addition to other measures, NARA is increasing video surveillance and mandating that traffic bollards stay up closer to the building.

Many of these measures mirror security standards that have been in place for many years at the research rooms at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. and research facilities at presidential libraries.

We look forward to continuing to always welcome researchers to College Park.

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