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The Trump administration has decided to continue displaying the rainbow Pride flag at the Stonewall National Monument, a move that comes after its removal in February. This decision marks a reversal in policy announced on Monday.
The announcement was made as the government seeks to resolve a lawsuit initiated by LGBTQ+ and historic preservation groups. These groups had challenged the removal of the flag. The agreement remains subject to approval by a judge.
According to documents filed in court, the Interior Department and the National Park Service have confirmed their commitment to keeping the Pride flag flying at Stonewall. The flag will only be taken down for “maintenance or other practical reasons.”
As part of the settlement, the Park Service has agreed to hoist three flags on the Stonewall monument’s flagpole within a week. The arrangement will place the Pride flag between the U.S. flag and the National Park Service flag, with each flag measuring three feet by five feet.
The presence of the Pride flag at Stonewall has been at the center of debates concerning President Donald Trump’s handling of the site, which holds the distinction of being the first national monument dedicated to LGBTQ+ history, as well as other historically significant locations.
After a yearslong campaign by activists who wanted the flag symbolizing LGBTQ+ pride to be flown daily inside the park service-run site, the banner was formally installed in 2022, during Democratic President Joe Biden ‘s tenure.
At the time, park service officials in New York called the display a sign of the government’s commitment to “telling the complex and diverse histories of all Americans.”
But in February, the park service removed the flag, in what the agency explained as compliance with federal guidance on flag displays. A Jan. 21 park service memo largely restricts the agency to displaying the U.S., Department of the Interior and POW/MIA flags, with exemptions that include providing “historical context.”
The park service insisted that the monument “remains committed to preserving and interpreting the history and significance of this site” through various exhibits and programs. But LGBTQ+ activists saw the flag’s removal as a targeted affront meant to diminish a site that is all about their fight for rights and visibility.
Advocates and some New York Democratic elected officials turned up soon after with another rainbow flag and – after some heated moments when the politicians seemed content to leave it on a separate, lower pole – raised it up alongside the U.S. flag that the park service had installed.
Democratic President Barack Obama created the Stonewall monument in 2016. The monument centers on a tiny park across the street from the Stonewall Inn, the gay bar where a 1969 police raid sparked an uprising and helped catalyze the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement.
After Trump, a Republican, returned to office last year, he took aim at diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and protections for transgender people. In one outcome of his policies, many references to transgender people were excised from the monument’s website and materials.
Trump’s administration similarly has put national parks, museums and landmarks under a messaging microscope, aiming to remove or alter materials that the government says are “divisive or partisan” or “inappropriately disparage Americans.”
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