Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth stripped Harvey Milk’s name from a Navy ship during Pride Month. This wasn’t neutral. It’s targeted LGBTQ+ erasure…
On June 27, the Pentagon announced that the USNS Harvey Milk — one of the very few U.S. military vessels ever named after an openly gay American — would be renamed. The new name? The USNS Oscar V. Peterson, after a World War II Navy hero.
Peterson’s bravery isn’t in question. But the decision to wipe Harvey Milk’s name off that ship, and to do it during Pride Month, wasn’t neutral. It was a statement. And it landed exactly as intended.
Why Harvey Milk’s name mattered
Harvey Milk served in the Navy. He wore the uniform. And like thousands of other queer service members, he was forced out — quietly pushed aside under suspicion of being gay. He later became the first openly gay elected official in California, and a national symbol of queer political courage. Milk was assassinated in 1978. He’s a martyr, not just a milestone.
When the Navy named a ship after him in 2016, it wasn’t just a symbolic gesture. It was a long-overdue correction. An acknowledgment of the people who served this country while having to lie about who they were. His name on that ship was a rare gesture of inclusion from an institution that spent decades pretending people like Milk didn’t exist.
That ship didn’t just carry fuel. It carried a message: LGBTQ+ people have always been here, and we’ve always served.
The excuse: “Depoliticizing” ship names
This wasn’t just a quiet nameplate swap. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, in a carefully scripted rollout, said the Department was “taking the politics out of ship-naming.” That sounds bureaucratic. It’s not. It’s ideological. It’s a way of framing LGBTQ+ identity itself as inherently “political” — too controversial, too complicated, too much.
It’s worth noting: Peterson’s name is being added because of his heroism in battle. No one disputes he deserves recognition. But that’s not the full story. This isn’t about Peterson versus Milk. This is about erasing what Harvey Milk represents — visibility, defiance, survival — and returning the military’s narrative to something more sanitized. More comfortable. More historically “straight.”
A pattern, not a one-off
The renaming isn’t happening in a vacuum. It’s part of a bigger pattern that’s been unfolding since the current administration returned to power. Back in January, Trump signed an executive order banning expanded pronoun use and gender identity visibility across the military. There’s been a broader effort to roll back LGBTQ+ protections in federal policy — and now, apparently, in federal symbolism too.
The message is consistent: erase, restrict, reframe. This administration isn’t just turning back the clock. It’s trying to rewrite the record entirely.
Milk’s name being pulled from the hull of a Navy ship might seem minor to some. But if you think names don’t matter, ask yourself why they’re going out of their way to change them.
Pride Month wasn’t an afterthought
The announcement dropped June 27 — right at the end of Pride. There’s no way that’s a coincidence.
Pride, at its core, is about visibility. About refusing to be erased. About honoring the people who were criminalized, ostracized, or killed for being openly queer. It started as a riot. It continues as a fight.
So what does it say when the U.S. military, during the one month supposedly set aside to acknowledge LGBTQ+ lives and history, decides to strip the only Navy ship named after an openly gay American? That’s not an oversight. That’s targeted.
It’s saying: not only are you unwelcome now — you never should have been here in the first place.
Whose history gets remembered?
Every ship name is a message. Every monument. Every bronze plaque. They’re not neutral. They’re decisions — choices about which stories get remembered, and which ones quietly disappear.
Removing Harvey Milk’s name isn’t about Peterson’s bravery. It’s about rewriting the story the military tells about itself. A story where queer people are edited out, again. A story where progress can be undone with a press release and some fresh paint.
This wasn’t “just a rename.” It was another erasure of culture towards queer people, something we have been talking about often. This is a reminder, a warning, and a clear path to much more to come.
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