On Monday, the National Park Service (NPS) removed a Pride flag from the Stonewall National Monument in New York City — a move many observers have condemned as just the latest attempt by the Trump administration to erase LGBTQ history and culture in the U.S.
The Stonewall Inn is a dive bar in Manhattan that is widely considered the birthplace of the LGBTQ liberation movement. In 1969, the bar was the site of a historic uprising in which LGBTQ people fought back after years of facing harassment, raids, and brutality from New York City police, an event that is commemorated by annual Pride parades across the country.
The removal of the Pride flag (sometimes referred to as the rainbow flag) was based on an Interior Department guidance from last month, NPS said in a statement. That guidance requires that “only the U.S. flag and other congressionally or departmentally authorized flags” be flown on agency-managed sites.
The move comes months after NPS scrubbed references to transgender and queer people on the Stonewall National Monument website. The agency said the changes were made to comply with an executive order signed by President Donald Trump that aimed to restore “biological truth to the federal government” — in other words, to erase any mention of transgender people.
NPS claims that, despite the removal of the Pride flag, the monument “continues to preserve and interpret the site’s historic significance through exhibits and programs” — though the agency wasn’t specific about what history is still being preserved in its statement.
When asked by TIME whether the flag would be restored in the near future, the Interior Department struck a hostile tone against city officials.
“While Mayor [Zohran] Mamdani and his City Council are trying to distract from their recent failures, it would be a better use of their time to get the trash buildup off city streets and work to get the power back on for the people of New York City,” the department said in a statement.
The removal prompted over 100 protesters to descend on the monument Tuesday, condemning the administration’s actions and demanding that the flag be restored.
“To think you can go to Stonewall and just take down the Pride flag — that is telling of the time we are living in,” said Stacy Lentz, co-owner of the Stonewall Inn.”It is unbelievable.”
“It’s hate, it’s erasure,” said Chloe Elentári, a transgender New York City resident.
Several New York City lawmakers similarly denounced the removal of the flag, vowing to restore it themselves later this week.
“Our community is not going to stand by idly as the Trump administration tries to erase our history,” Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal said in a video message, promising to be part of a gathering at 4 pm on Thursday “to re-raise the Pride Flag.”
“I am outraged by the removal of the Rainbow Pride Flag from Stonewall National Monument. New York is the birthplace of the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement, and no act of erasure will ever change, or silence, that history,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a social media post, adding:
Our city has a duty not just to honor this legacy, but to live up to it. I will always fight for a New York City that invests in our LGBTQ+ community, defends their dignity, and protects every one of our neighbors — without exception.
“This is a deliberate act of erasure,” read a joint statement from Hoylman-Sigal, State Sen. Erik Bottcher, and Assemblymember Deborah Glick. “The Pride Flag is history, resistance, and Pride born at Stonewall itself. Taking it down does not diminish our community. It exposes an administration afraid of visibility and truth. Our history will not be erased, and our Pride is not theirs to take down.”
Speaker of the City Council Julie Menin, joined by council members Chi Ossé and Justin Sanchez, co-chairs of the LGBTQIA+ Caucus, also condemned the removal of the Pride flag, writing in a joint letter:
In the year of the United States of America’s 250th anniversary, American monuments like Stonewall matter more than ever. This is a moment to honor, celebrate, and uplift American culture and history. This decision sends a deeply troubling message, one that shows the world that we are willing to sanitize and erase our history and the very values that make America great.
“We urge the National Parks Service to immediately return the Pride flag to the Stonewall National Monument where it belongs,” the council members added.
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