References in a US Coast Guard policy calling hate symbols “potentially divisive” were removed Thursday, and a US senator said she was lifting the hold she had placed on a nomination for the service’s top job.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, whose agency oversees the Coast Guard, said on social media that the latest changes were made so that no one could “misrepresent” the branch’s position.
“The superseded and outdated policy pages will be completely expunged from the record so no news outlet, entity or elected official can misrepresent the Coast Guard to politicize their policies and lie about their position on divisive and hateful symbols,” Noem said.
The move appears to end the back-and-forth revisions to the Coast Guard’s policy on svastikas, nooses and other symbols of hate, which have sparked uproar. The Department of Internal Security said that “there was never a ‘downgrade'” in the language of the policy.
Noem’s announcement came a day after Democratic Senator Jacky Rosen of Nevada said she was holding up Adm. Kevin Lunday’s nomination for Coast Guard commander because the leadership appeared to have “backtracked” on a commitment that svastikas and nooses are considered symbols of hate and prohibited from being displayed.
Rosen said Thursday on social media that she was lifting the hold and looking forward to working with Lunday to further strengthen the Coast Guard’s anti-harassment policy.
“While I continue to have reservations about the process by which this happened and the confusion created by the leadership at the Department of Homeland Security, I am pleased to see that the policy now refers directly to stronger language against svastikas and nooses,” she said.
Noem called the delay of Monday’s nomination a “political holdup,” saying it has gone on long enough and should be confirmed without delay.
“He gave nearly 39 years of distinguished service to the Coast Guard, this country, and the American people,” she said.
The Coast Guard’s planned policy change calling hate symbols “potentially divisive” went public last month. She did not stop short of banning them, instead saying that commanders can take steps to remove them from public view and that the rule does not apply to private spaces, such as family housing.
DHS said the change “strengthens our ability to report, investigate and prosecute violators of longstanding policy.”
The Coast Guard said on social media that it “maintains a zero-tolerance policy toward symbols of hate, extremist ideology, and any conduct that undermines our core values. We prohibit the display or promotion of symbols of hate in any form. Any suggestion otherwise is false.”
The Washington Post first reported the latest developments.