Thompson Statement on Coast Guard Under Trump No Longer Classifying Swastikas & Nooses as Hate Symbols
(WASHINGTON) – Today, Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS), Ranking Member of the Committee on Homeland Security, released the following statement on news reports the U.S. Coast Guard - part of the Department of Homeland Security - will no longer classify swastikas, nooses as hate symbols:
"The Coast Guard's apparent new harassment policy, which could allow for the display of swastikas and nooses, is vile and horrific. Swastikas and nooses aren't 'potentially divisive'; they are longstanding and well known representations of genocide and lynchings.
“The Coast Guard has a long, ugly history of discrimination and hate incidents which it has worked to address. In 2020, the Coast Guard finally banned the display of Confederate flags after I wrote the Commandant urging him to do so. But now, the Trump Administration is looking to take us back all the way to the era of the Nazi Party and the Jim Crow South. They can’t whine when we call their actions fascist when they continue to do things like this.
“This morning, Trump threatened hangings of Democratic Members of Congress for stating that members of the military have an obligation to follow the law. Now he wants to allow service members to display violent symbols that reflect hate towards their fellow troops. This politicization of our Armed Forces subverts military readiness and makes us all less safe.
“Now that they’re being called out, the administration is trying to claim they don’t mean what the policy says. If so, they should rescind and denounce the policy immediately and go back to the drawing board before putting its servicemembers through this again."
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