Former museum trustees and donors of the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art are decrying a proposal that would transfer control of the institution and its over 10,000-item collection to the New College of Florida (NCF), which has gained national attention over the last few years for undergoing a right-wing transformation. Based in Sarasota, the Ringling has been under the oversight of Florida State University (FSU) for more than two decades, making it one of the largest university-affiliated art museums in the United States. Established in 1927 by circus entrepreneur John Ringling and his spouse Mable to house the couple’s art collection, it is the official state art museum of Florida and houses works spanning antiquity to contemporary times, including five paintings in Peter Paul Rubens’s Triumph of the Eucharist (1625) series. The museum is part of the larger Ringling Center for Cultural Arts, which encompasses the Ca’ d’Zan mansion, a circus museum, a reconstructed Renaissance-era performing arts theater, and 66 acres of gardens.The new ownership proposal was revealed in DeSantis’s preliminary $115.6 billion budget for the 2025–2026 fiscal year, which will be voted on by Florida lawmakers in the state’s upcoming 60-day legislative session beginning March 4. If it passes, NCF will take over the Ringling on August 1, uprooting FSU’s established on-site academic programs in theatre, dance, art, art history, and museum management, and putting the employment of current museum workers — including FSU faculty members — in limbo.This week, a group under the name of Citizens to Protect the Ringling published an open letter addressed to Ringling patrons, FSU alumni, and Sarasota community members, advocating for the museum to stay under FSU’s oversight. Signed by six former Ringling foundation chairs and nine board members and donors, the missive argues that the transfer would jeopardize the museum’s legacy and have negative consequences for FSU and Sarasota.“[The proposal] is clearly a waste of taxpayer resources to disrupt a proven Florida State University-Ringling partnership that has delivered significant benefits to our students, state and local community,” the letter reads. The missive also argues that the transition could lead to the sale of collection items and museum buildings, risk the Ringling’s national accreditation, and put the preservation of the institution at risk. “Change in stewardship from an institution like FSU that brings vast expertise, experience, infrastructure, staffing, rapid emergency response, to a small college that lacks these attributes and abilities has costly, perhaps catastrophic consequences to the institution, the collections and our community writ large,” an attached statement reads.In recent years, NCF has been the subject of a right-wing overhaul spearheaded by DeSantis, who appointed a slew of political allies to the school’s governing board of trustees in 2023. In turn, the board has led an ideologically aligned hiring spree across a range of positions including the college president. After the board fired previous sitting president Patricia Okker in 2023, they appointed former Republican state representative Richard Corcoran to the role, who has brought on a fleet of conservative faculty and staff. Longtime faculty and students have since left the school in droves.NCF also was subjected to a state audit last year, which revealed a series of financial missteps that included overpaying employees and failing to collect more than $160,000 from students.It is unclear what impact the transition from FSU to NCF would have on the Ringling’s current staff, which includes FSU faculty who lead Ringling-based courses and internships as part of the Department of Art History’s Museum and Cultural Heritage Studies Master of Arts program and the specialized Museum Education and Visitor-Centered Curation program. FSU and NCF did not respond to Hyperallergic’s inquiries on the matter.In their open letter, Citizens to Protect the Ringling encourage Sarasota community members to voice their concerns about the transfer proposal to their state representatives. Nancy Parrish, one of the group’s members and a former chair at the Ringling, told Hyperallergic that they have received “droves” of community support to their campaign.“The proposed takeover of this historic, independent museum has brought shockwaves through the gulf coast community and the Ringling’s statewide support network, whose awareness of tiny New College’s precarious financial position has led to a potential mass exodus of major cash and collections,” Parrish said.“Disruption of this successful deep relationship between FSU and the Ringling will serve no purpose other than to shore up a questionable balance sheet and subject the Museum’s treasured collections to likely devastation,” she added.