Until recently, a page on the Defense Department’s website celebrated Pfc. Ira Hayes, a Pima Indian who was one of the six Marines photographed hoisting a U.S. flag on Iwo Jima in 1945, as an emblem of the “contributions and sacrifices Native Americans have made to the United States, not just in the military, but in all walks of life.”
But the page, along with many others about Native American and other minority service members, has now been erased amid the Trump administration’s wide-ranging crackdown on what it says are “diversity, equity and inclusion” efforts in the federal government, a review by The Washington Post found.
Multiple articles about the Navajo code talkers, who were critical to America’s victory at Iwo Jima and the wider Pacific theater of the Second World War, were also removed, along with a profile of a Tonawanda Seneca officer who drafted the terms of the Confederacy’s surrender at Appomattox toward the end of the Civil War.
The purge, which also targeted multiple webpages about women and LGBTQ+ service members, highlights how aggressively military leaders are pursuing President Donald Trump’s anti-DEI mandate. Their actions mean that some of the most authoritative sources of public information about the achievements of minority service members decades before government DEI programs existed have disappeared. Some of the articles, including the piece about Hayes, remain online on websites or social media accounts for the individual branches of the military.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has vigorously supported an executive order that Trump issued on his first day in office banning DEI from federal government programs and contracts, which he claimed were “immoral” and wasteful. In a memo last month, a senior Hegseth aide announced a “digital content refresh,” requiring officials to take “all practicable steps” to remove articles and other media that “promote Diversity, Equity and Inclusion” from the department’s website and social media accounts.
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In response to questions about The Post’s findings, Pentagon spokesperson John Ullyot issued a statement that did not mention the removal of specific websites but praised the department’s “rapid compliance” with the directive.
“As Secretary Hegseth has said, DEI is dead at the Defense Department. Efforts to divide the force — to put one group ahead of another through DEI programs — erode camaraderie and threaten mission execution,” Ullyot said in the statement Monday. He added: “In the rare cases that content is removed that is out of the clearly outlined scope of the directive, we instruct components accordingly.”
Last week, the website Task & Purpose, which covers military news, reported that Arlington National Cemetery had removed links on its website to information about prominent Black, Hispanic and female service members, along with material on topics such as the Civil War. A Defense Department webpage about Maj. Gen. Charles Calvin Rogers, a Medal of Honor recipient who was Black, was also briefly removed, before later being restored. Axios first reported the removal of more pages, including those about code talkers, earlier Monday.
But the page, along with many others about Native American and other minority service members, has now been erased amid the Trump administration’s wide-ranging crackdown on what it says are “diversity, equity and inclusion” efforts in the federal government, a review by The Washington Post found.
Multiple articles about the Navajo code talkers, who were critical to America’s victory at Iwo Jima and the wider Pacific theater of the Second World War, were also removed, along with a profile of a Tonawanda Seneca officer who drafted the terms of the Confederacy’s surrender at Appomattox toward the end of the Civil War.
The purge, which also targeted multiple webpages about women and LGBTQ+ service members, highlights how aggressively military leaders are pursuing President Donald Trump’s anti-DEI mandate. Their actions mean that some of the most authoritative sources of public information about the achievements of minority service members decades before government DEI programs existed have disappeared. Some of the articles, including the piece about Hayes, remain online on websites or social media accounts for the individual branches of the military.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has vigorously supported an executive order that Trump issued on his first day in office banning DEI from federal government programs and contracts, which he claimed were “immoral” and wasteful. In a memo last month, a senior Hegseth aide announced a “digital content refresh,” requiring officials to take “all practicable steps” to remove articles and other media that “promote Diversity, Equity and Inclusion” from the department’s website and social media accounts.
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In response to questions about The Post’s findings, Pentagon spokesperson John Ullyot issued a statement that did not mention the removal of specific websites but praised the department’s “rapid compliance” with the directive.
“As Secretary Hegseth has said, DEI is dead at the Defense Department. Efforts to divide the force — to put one group ahead of another through DEI programs — erode camaraderie and threaten mission execution,” Ullyot said in the statement Monday. He added: “In the rare cases that content is removed that is out of the clearly outlined scope of the directive, we instruct components accordingly.”
Last week, the website Task & Purpose, which covers military news, reported that Arlington National Cemetery had removed links on its website to information about prominent Black, Hispanic and female service members, along with material on topics such as the Civil War. A Defense Department webpage about Maj. Gen. Charles Calvin Rogers, a Medal of Honor recipient who was Black, was also briefly removed, before later being restored. Axios first reported the removal of more pages, including those about code talkers, earlier Monday.
