Pride flag removed from Stonewall monument
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A National Park Service ranger places rainbow flags on the fence at the Stonewall National Monument in New York City on June 19, 2019. Photo: Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images
New York City council members are demanding answers after a pride flag was removed from New York's Stonewall National Monument, the birthplace of the modern queer rights movement.
The big picture: The removal comes amid a broader federal effort to scrub LGBTQ+ history from government sites and single out transgender people, raising fears among LGBTQ+ advocates that their community faces erasure from public life.
- "It's an outrage," says Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal. "But it's an outrage upon another outrage because we know that this administration seems very comfortable in attacking religious, ethnic and other minorities, including the LGBTQ population."
The latest: New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin and other council members urged the National Park Service to re-raise the flag in a Tuesday letter to acting Director Jessica Bowron.
- They also requested "a prompt response outlining the rationale behind this decision" and an outline of steps the agency will take "to ensure that the Stonewall National Monument continues to reflect the truth of its history and the community it represents."
Catch up quick: The Gay City News reported the removal Monday.
- The NPS tells Axios it followed "government-wide guidance" requiring "only the U.S. flag and other congressionally or departmentally authorized flags" fly on "NPS-managed flagpoles, with limited exceptions."
- NPS did not say when the flag had been removed. The Interior Department did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.
Yes, but: A January memo includes narrow exemptions for non-agency flags, such as those that "provide historical context" or "are part of historic reenactments."
What they're saying: Hoylman-Sigal says community members will not "sit back idly." They plan to raise the flag again on Thursday.
- "If we're barred from raising the flag, then it will be a protest ... in the spirit of 1969," when the uprising took place, he says.
- "Stonewall is sacred ground," Menin said in a statement. "It is the birthplace of the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement, and the removal of the Pride flag from the Stonewall National Monument is a deliberate and cowardly attempt to erase that history."
- Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) called for the removal to be "reversed right now" and said "that flag will return. New Yorkers will see to it."
Flashback: Transgender people, notably trans women of color, played central roles in the Stonewall uprising, but mentions of transgender people were erased from the NPS Stonewall website last year.
- Across the country, the administration has altered historic monuments under a mandate to eradicate what it calls a "corrosive ideology."
Friction point: New York state Sen. Erik Bottcher (D) slammed the removal of the flag as "a deliberate act of erasure."
- He vowed in a statement provided to Axios that the community "will not be erased, we will not be silenced, and the Pride flag will fly again at the birthplace of our movement."
Go deeper: NPS restores Underground Railroad history after outcry
Editor's note: This story has been updated with comments from New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin and Chuck Schumer.
