Hegseth renames USNS Harvey Milk during Pride Week, claims move isn't political

Muri Assunção, New York Daily News on Jun 27, 2025

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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced Friday that a U.S. Navy ship previously named after LGBTQ rights hero Harvey Milk will be renamed the USNS Oscar V. Peterson — a move he said was aimed at “taking the politics out of ship-naming,” despite unveiling the decision just ahead of Pride Weekend.

“We’re not renaming the ship to anything political,” Hegseth said in a video shared on social media. “This is not about political activists — unlike the previous administration.”

Milk, who served in the Navy during the Korean War, was forced to resign at the rank of lieutenant junior grade in 1955 after being questioned about his sexual orientation.

He later made history as California’s first openly gay elected official when he was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977. He was assassinated inside City Hall the following year, just months after helping pass a landmark bill banning discrimination on sexual orientation in housing and employment.

In 2016, the U.S. Navy announced it would name a ship after Milk. Construction began in late 2019, and two years later, Navy veteran Paula Neira christened the USNS Harvey Milk (T-AO 206) during a ceremony in San Diego Bay attended by state and local leaders.

Oscar V. Peterson, the ship’s new namesake, was a World War II watertender who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for heroism during a 1942 Japanese attack on the USS Neosho in the Battle of the Coral Sea.

A Navy escort ship named after him was decommissioned in 1965 after more than two decades of service.

Earlier this month, after reports emerged that Hegseth had ordered Navy Secretary John Phelan to put together a team to rename the USNS Harvey Milk, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi slammed the move as a “shameful, vindictive erasure of those who fought to break down barriers for all to chase the American Dream.”

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