Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Friday that the U.S. Navy was renaming the U.S.N.S. Harvey Milk, a fleet replenishment ship that had been named for a Navy veteran who was one of the country’s first openly gay elected officials.
He said that the vessel would be renamed for Oscar V. Peterson, a chief petty officer who posthumously received the Medal of Honor for valor during World War II.
“We are taking the politics out of ship naming,” Mr. Hegseth said in a statement released on social media.
The announcement — which came during Pride Month — was not unexpected. Earlier this month, Mr. Hegseth said he had ordered a review of Navy vessels named after prominent civil rights leaders, and the ship named after Mr. Milk was seen as a possible candidate for a change. The review was in keeping with the Trump administration’s drive to expunge diversity, equity and inclusion efforts from the federal government, a senior defense official familiar with the decision said at the time.
Mr. Hegseth said on Friday that the Trump administration’s focus in the decision was not “political activists, unlike the previous administration.”
“People want to be proud of the ship they are sailing in,” he said.
Mr. Milk served in the Navy for four years, including a stint during the Korean War on a submarine rescue ship, and later as a diving instructor. In 1955, after his superiors learned that he was gay, he was given an “other than honorable discharge.”
In 1977, he became California’s first openly gay elected official when he was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.
He served less than a year before being assassinated at City Hall alongside the city’s mayor, George Moscone, by Dan White, a former member of the board.
The tanker was christened the U.S.N.S. Harvey Milk in 2021, the first Navy ship to be named for an openly gay person.
At the ceremony, Carlos Del Toro, the navy secretary at the time, said he felt compelled to be there to make amends for the wrongful treatment of L.G.B.T.Q. people in the military “and to tell them that we’re committed to them in the future.”
The Pentagon said on June 3 that Mr. Hegseth’s order to review the names of defense assets was “reflective of the commander in chief’s priorities, our nation’s history and the warrior ethos.” Mr. Hegseth said in his announcement on Friday that Mr. Peterson was a fitting veteran for the honor.
In 1942, Mr. Peterson was serving in the Navy during the battle in the Coral Sea against the Japanese advance in the Pacific. On May 7 of that year, Mr. Peterson was in charge of a repair party on the U.S.S. Neosho, a fleet oiler, when Japanese air forces attacked.
Mr. Peterson, who was wounded along with members of his repair team, managed to close a bulkhead valve, but died of burn wounds.
Mr. Hegseth said on Friday that his “heroic” actions had helped keep the ship operational. “His spirit of self sacrifice and concern for his crewmates was in keeping with the finest traditions of the Navy,” he said.
Christine Hauser is a Times reporter who writes breaking news stories, features and explainers.
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