Coast Guard backtracks after swastikas, nooses ‘potentially divisive’
Nov. 21 (UPI) — The U.S. Coast Guard has reversed course on swastikas and nooses, saying they are “hate symbols” after reportedly issuing guidance calling them “potentially divisive.”
The agency late Thursday said the guidance “doubles down on its current policies prohibiting the display, distribution or use of hate symbols by Coast Guard personnel.”
“This is not an updated policy but a new policy to combat any misinformation and double down that the U.S. Coast Guard forbids these symbols,” the Coast Guard, which is part of Homeland Security, said in a news release.
The new guidance came after media outlets, led by The Washington Post, earlier Thursday reported that the Coast Guard had written a less firm policy earlier this month.
Since 2023, Coast Guard policy said displaying the symbols “constitutes a potential hate incident.”
“The Coast Guard does not tolerate the display of divisive or hate symbols and flags, including those identified with oppression or hatred,” the Coast Guard wrote about the policy on Thursday night.
“These symbols reflect hateful and prohibited conduct that undermines unit cohesion. A symbol or flag is prohibited as a reflection of hate if its display adversely affects good order and discipline, unit cohesion, command climate, morale, or mission effectiveness.”
Listed were “a noose, a swastika, and any symbols or flags co-opted or adopted by hate-based groups as representations of supremacy, racial or religious intolerance, anti-semitism or any other improper bias.”
The policy applies to all personnel and they “shall be removed from all Coast Guard workplaces, facilities and assets,” the agency said.
Also, all displays or depictions of Confederate battle flags continue to be prohibited.
In the earlier reported policy, commanders could take steps to remove them from public view and that the rule did not apply to private spaces outside public view, including family housing.
“At a time when anti-Semitism is rising in the United States and around the world, relaxing policies aimed at fighting hate crimes not only sends the wrong message to the men and women of our Coast Guard, but it puts their safety at risk,” Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen of Nevada said Thursday.
She said the change “rolls back important protections against bigotry and could allow for horrifically hateful symbols, like swastikas and nooses, to be inexplicably permitted to be displayed.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., called the change “disgusting” and said “it’s more encouragement from the Republicans of extremism.”
Adm. Kevin Lunday, acting commandant of the Coast Guard, called it “categorically false” to claim prohibitions were rolled back.
“These symbols have been and remain prohibited in the Coast Guard per policy,” Lunday said in a statement, adding that “any display, use or promotion of such symbols, as always, will be thoroughly investigated and severely punished.”
DHS denied there was a revision.
“The 2025 policy is not changing — USCG issued a lawful order that doubles down on our current policies prohibiting the display, distribution or use of hate symbols by Coast Guard personnel,” spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said to CNN.
Nooses are a symbol of hatred of black people, with thousands lynched between the end of the Civil War and the beginning of the civil rights movement.
Swastikas represent Adolf Hitler‘s Nazi Germany, which killed millions of people during the Holocaust.
About 1,900 died while serving in the Coast Guard during World War II against Germany.
“The swastika is the ultimate symbol of virulent hate and bigotry, and even a consideration by the Coast Guard to no longer classify it as such would be equivalent to dismissing the Ku Klux Klan‘s burning crosses and hoods as merely ‘potentially divisive,'” Menachem Rosensaft, a law professor at Cornell University and a Jewish community leader, said in a statement to Military Times.
Other armed services are part of the Department of Defense.
In 2020, a Pentagon report found that extremist views were not widespread in the military, though there was the ability of people with military experience to carry out “high-impact events.”
Two months ago, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered a review of all the hazing, bullying and harassment definitions across the military. He said they were “overly broad” and were “jeopardizing combat readiness, mission accomplishment and trust in the organization.”
During his confirmation hearing in January, Hegseth said a focus on extremism has “created a climate inside our ranks that feels political when it hasn’t ever been political.”
