New York — In a dramatic reversal, Luigi Mangione’s legal team on Thursday backed away from a plan to use a psychiatric defense when his case goes to trial in state court in September. Mangione has pleaded not guilty to murdering health insurance CEO Brian Thompson in 2024 on a Manhattan street.

At a hearing only a day earlier before state Judge Gregory Carro, Mangione’s attorneys confirmed that Mangione had been undergoing psychiatric evaluation. They signaled that his defense would be based at least in part on the argument that Mangione was experiencing “extreme emotional disturbance.”

But in a one-line letter sent to Carro on Thursday, Mangione’s team said that “at this time” they no longer intend to introduce psychiatric evidence during the trial. It’s unclear what sparked the shift. Mangione’s team didn’t respond to NPR’s request for comment.

Former Manhattan prosecutor and legal analyst Gary Galperin told NPR it was a “stunning reversal” for Mangione to withdraw from the psychiatric defense. “One can only speculate at this point as to the reasons,” he said.

“What remains, of course, at this point is the question of what defense they will pursue at trial,” he added.

This maneuver came after Carro ordered Mangione’s attorneys to quickly share psychiatric information with prosecutors.

“They need to know what the malady is that this defendant suffers and how that triggered extreme emotional distress,” he said, during Wednesday’s hearing. “I’m not going to let you surprise people on the eve of trial. Get it done.”

Assistant Manhattan District Attorney Joel Seidemann repeatedly complained that Mangione’s team was “stonewalling” the prosecution by withholding medical information about his psychiatric state. “We have gotten nothing,” Seidemann said.

Mangione’s lead attorney Karen Friedman Agnifilo denied her team was delaying the court process or improperly withholding information.

The museums, designed by conservative nonprofits and Trump appointees, tell the story of early America, from colonization to revolution. The one exhibition looking beyond the early years is the “Wall of American Heroes.” It is a list of 51 people, chosen to illustrate 250 years of American history.

A White House spokesman said they were “individuals who shaped this nation’s history, culture and spirit across generations.”

The people pictured on this national honor roll — and the people left out — help illustrate what this administration sees as the highlights of American history.

Amid the administration’s efforts to reshape the nation’s relationship with its past, Trump appointees heavily weighted the list toward a single era of American history — and a few specific kinds of hero.

The other exhibitions in the Freedom Trucks were crafted by a pair of conservative nonprofits, PragerU and Hillsdale College. But the “Wall of American Heroes” was created by Freedom 250, a nonprofit effort whose leaders were chosen by President Trump and that was created to lead the planning of celebrations of the nation’s 250th birthday, overshadowing a bipartisan congressional commission.

A spokeswoman for Freedom 250 said Mr. Trump was not directly involved in the selection of those featured.

But the list clearly tracks Mr. Trump’s own lifetime and the heroes of the conservative political movement.

The wall’s tilt toward heroes of the baby boomer generation, for instance, extends beyond Hollywood stars and musicians. Of the four religious leaders on the list, two — Archbishop Fulton Sheen and the Rev. Billy Graham — also appeared on TV regularly in the 1950s and 1960s. The only painter on the list is Norman Rockwell, known for his idealized depictions of American life in that period.

By contrast, there is only a handful of figures from the first decades of American independence.

“That’s a disservice, if your intention is to present the last 250 years,” said Sarah Weicksel, the executive director of the American Historical Association. “Because all of the people on this list are building on the work and struggles and progress that was made by the people in the 150 years prior.”

The “Wall of American Heroes” was inspired by a similar display in a traveling museum created by the State of Virginia. But Virginia’s display celebrates little-known historical figures.

Mr. Trump’s, by and large, celebrates people who are already well-known — and, often, people who were famous in their own time. For example, it praises P.T. Barnum, a circus impresario who used hoaxes and freak shows to draw crowds. The wall calls him an “icon of American sensationalism.”

The spokeswoman for Freedom 250 said that many of the names on the wall were drawn from a list of 250 people that Mr. Trump wants to include in a “Garden of American Heroes” in Washington.

The spokeswoman declined to say what criteria were used to narrow down the list.

The only president whose name appears on the wall — not on the list of heroes, but alongside his quotation — is Mr. Trump himself.