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U.S. Navy portrait of then-Ensign Harvey Milk; Rep. Eric Sorensen outside the U.S. Capitol building, Washington, D.C., March 2023
It’s wrong and un-American to remove Milk's name from a Navy ship, the gay congressman says.
U.S. Rep. Eric Sorensen, a gay Democrat who’s the first out LGBTQ+ congressman from Illinois, delivered an impassioned defense of Harvey Milk at a House Armed Services Committee hearing Wednesday.
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Sorensen’s comments came in light of reports that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has ordered Milk’s name to be stripped from a Navy ship. Milk served in the Navy in the 1950s and saw action during the Korean War. He went on to become the first out gay elected official in California and one of the first few in the nation. He and San Francisco Mayor George Moscone were shot to death by a disgruntled former colleague, Dan White, in 1978. The USNS Harvey Milk was launched in November 2021, the first Navy ship to be named for an out gay person.
Sorensen confronted Navy Secretary John Phelan forcefully during the hearing. “From 1951 to 1955, this courageous American served our country in the Navy, just like my grandpa did,” the congressman said. “But unlike my grandpa, this veteran was forced to resign from the Navy, receiving an ‘other than honorable’ [discharge] rather than be court-martialed because of his homosexuality. Harvey Milk, like every veteran who served our nation, deserves our thanks. To Secretary Phelan, can you specifically explain to me and this committee why this administration no longer believes in honoring Mr. Harvey Milk’s service to our nation?”
Phelan responded that Hegseth wants all military installations to reflect Donald Trump’s priorities, U.S. history, and the “warrior ethos.” He said nothing about renaming has been decided yet and that decisions will be announced once a review is complete. Sorensen asked if Phelan could make clear to Hegseth that we should honor all veterans, and Phelan said, “I believe he does honor all veterans.”
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Sorensen then said, “As the only elected LGBTQ person on this committee and the first ever from my home state, I speak for my neighbors and all Americans when I say that Navy veteran Harvey Milk was a warrior in Korea before becoming an elected leader. His service and his life ended with an assassin’s bullet. I walk in the footsteps of leaders before me. He stood up for the same people who are being targeted, persecuted, and vilified by this administration today. My grandpa taught me to stand up for every veteran and thank them every time I see them, thank them for their service. But picking and choosing who deserves that thanks — it’s not just wrong, it is un-American.”
Sorensen signed on to a letter sent Wednesday to Hegseth objecting to the ship renaming. “This cruel, unnecessary decision, intentionally announced at the start of Pride Month, is not only an attempt to erase yet another pivotal moment in American history, but also an insult to countless LGBTQI+ service members and Veterans,” says the letter, which was led by Democratic U.S. Reps. Jill Tokuda of Hawaii and Nancy Pelosi of California. Nearly 70 other House members joined the letter as well.
The letter calls on Hegseth to rescind the renaming order and abandon any plans to change the names of other ships in the same class that are being built. The class, which consists of ships that refuel others, is named for the late congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis, and future ships in the class were originally set to be named for other civil rights icons, including labor leaders, abolitionists, and Supreme Court justices, but this is now being reconsidered.
