Washington, DC – U.S. Representative Jill Tokuda (HI-02), Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi (CA-11), Congressional Equality Caucus Chair Mark Takano (CA-39), and Representative Lateefah Simon (CA-12) led 66 other Members of Congress in a letter to U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth demanding that he rescind his order to rename the USNS Harvey Milk and reported plans to rename other vessels named after prominent civil rights leaders.
The letter describes Harvey Milk’s inspirational story, serving in the United States Navy and later becoming the first openly gay man elected to public office in California.
“Ordering this renaming and intentionally timing this announcement to coincide with Pride Month is a cruel insult to tens of thousands of LBTQI+ individuals currently serving in our nation’s military, as well as to an estimated one million LGBTQI+ veterans across the country. They have all served and sacrificed on behalf of our nation. Combined with your harmful decision to remove transgender service members from the military, your order is a slap in the face to all service members, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity, and sends the wrong signal that their service is not valued,” the letter stated.
“Alongside the planned renaming of Navy vessels named after other civil rights leaders, renaming the USNS Harvey Milk does nothing to ‘reestablish the warrior culture’ or to address real issues affecting our warfighters and national defense. Instead, these decisions to break longstanding Navy traditions merely serve to divide the Joint Force and erect barriers between our service members. They set a harmful and irresponsible precedent and risk the further politicization of our military.”
Rep. Tokuda, Speaker Emerita Pelosi, Ranking Member Takano, and Rep. Simon were joined by Reps. Gabe Amo, Becca Balint, Wesley Bell, Julia Brownley, Nikki Budzinski, Salud Carbajal, Judy Chu, Gil Cisneros, Emanuel Cleaver, Angie Craig, Jasmine Crockett, Sharice Davids, Danny Davis, Madeleine Dean, Suzan DelBene, Mark DeSaulnier, Dwight Evans, Cleo Fields, Lizzie Fletcher, Valerie Foushee, Laura Friedman, John Garamendi, Robert Garcia, Sylvia Garcia, Dan Goldman, Josh Gottheimer, Chrissy Houlahan, Jared Huffman, Sara Jacobs, Pramila Jayapal, Hank Johnson, Julie Johnson, Raja Krishnamoorthi, Rick Larsen, Summer Lee, Mike Levin, Sam Liccardo, Sarah McBride, Jennifer McClellan, Betty McCollum, Morgan McGarvey, James McGovern, Kweisi Mfume, Gwen Moore, Kevin Mullin, Jerrold Nadler, Eleanor Holmes Norton, Johnny Olszewski, Scott Peters, Mark Pocan, Delia Ramirez, Emily Randall, Andrea Salinas, Jan Schakowsky, Terri Sewell, Eric Sorensen, Greg Stanton, Marilyn Strickland, Mike Thompson, Rashida Tlaib, Paul Tonko, Ritchie Torres, Juan Vargas, Nydia Velázquez, Bonnie Watson Coleman, and Nikema Williams.
A copy of the letter can be found here.
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