Minister of Defense Pete HegSeth on 27 June 2025 announced that USNS Harvey Milk’s milk will be renamed the USNS Oscar V. Peterson, which will undress the first Navy that honors openly homosexual character. HegSeth framed the step as a depository naming of ships and emphasized Peterson’s medal of honorary heroism during World War II, where he rescued USS Neosho during the Battle of the Coral Sea and died of heavy burns.
Critics, including democratic leaders, condemned the timing during a month of pride as a “shameful, vengeful lubrication”. The Fleet Oiller, originally christened in 2021, namely a ship after civil rights, is now reminded of a non -political “warrior” who will align with Trump’s administration pressure to remove Dei initiatives and restore “military ethos”.
Harvey Milk Heritage: The naval veteran turned a civil rights pioneer
Before his activism, milk served as a diving officer of the Navy during the Korean War, but in 1955 the “other than honest” release was pushed out after he faced interrogation over his sexuality. When he moved to San Francisco, he opened the camera shop in the Castro district, co -founded the first US business association LGBTQ+ and in 1977 he won a seat in the San Francisco Supervisor Supervisor Council.
As the first California open homosexual elected official, he adopted the laws on anti -discrimination in the field of united trade unions with marginalized communities and led the defeat of the proposition 6 (Briggs initiative), which tried to forbid homosexual teachers. His defense focused on the authorizing closed individual: “If a bullet enters my brain, let it break all the cabinet doors”.
Discussion and wider consequences for military recognition
The renaming intensifies the political division, while the Navy documents reveal plans to re -evaluate other vessels named for civil rights leaders such as Thurgood Marshall and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Milk nephew, Stuart Milk, previously refused to upgrade the status of the release of his uncle to preserve the “reminder” of historical discrimination – the nuances shaded by HegSeth’s focus on Peterson’s fighting victim. While the Republican warrior “Warrior ethos” of the Master of the Democrats claims that the posthumous presidential medal of Freedom Milk (2009) and global recognition, including schools, stamps and California state holidays, reflect its lasting impact on equality. The rechristening of the ship underlines the cultural clash: whether military honor should exclusively valorize the heroism of the battlefield or also include leaders who have expanded freedoms.
(Tagstotranslate) USNS HARVEY MILK (T) USNS Oscar V. Peterson
