US President Donald Trump said on Monday that he opposed removing the statue of Theodore Roosevelt outside New York City's Museum of Natural History.
The move was announced on Sunday and comes amid anti-racism protests across the U.S. and the world after the death of an unarmed black man, George Floyd, in police custody on May 25 in the United States.
The statue shows Roosevelt on a horse, with a Native American man and an African man by his side.
Many have said the statue symbolizes racial discrimination and colonial expansion.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said on Sunday that the city was in favor of the request from the museum to remove the statue because it "depicts black and indigenous people as subjugated and racially inferior."
"Ridiculous, don't do it", Trump said in a tweet on Monday.