U.S. Department of Defense censorship of DEI-connected material

The changes were apparently in compliance with an executive order by President Donald Trump abolishing diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility programs. For approximately 20 years prior to Trump's order, the U.S. military had perceived "DEI" as strategically valuable, as it supported other personnel recruitment and retention programs. Guidance released in February stated, "By March 5, 2025, all Components must remove and archive DoD news articles, photos, and videos promoting DEI, including content related to critical race theory, gender ideology, and identity-based programs." On March 19, the Defense Department told ABC News that "some" pages may have been "mistakenly" removed due to the search terms used for the DEI scrubbing process and would be restored. The content removals may have been the result of an artificial intelligence system that was human-prompted to seek out and remove content associated with "DEI initiatives." == Response ==

Pentagon press secretary John Ullyot also told ABC that DEI is "a form of Woke cultural Marxism... as Secretary Hegseth has said, DEI is dead at the Defense Department." On March 21 the Washington Post reported that Ullyot had been sidelined as a spokesperson for the Defense Department. Parnell also argued that during Joe Biden's administration the department had a "zealous and destructive commitment to DEI." American historian Heather Cox Richardson has argued that the "erasure of Indigenous, Black, Hispanic, and female veterans from our military history is an attempt to elevate white men as the sole actors in our history." == Affected materials ==

Content removed by the Department of Defense included: • The U.S. Air Force deleted a biography of the first woman in United States Air Force Thunderbirds demonstration squadron, retired colonel Nicole Malachowski. • The U.S. Marine Corps deleted an article about the first Black Marine, technical sergeant Alfred Masters, who joined the service in 1942 for the Pacific War (1941–45). • The Department of Defense deleted a profile of the first-ever black Medal of Honor recipient, Sergeant William Carney of the 54th Massachusetts Colored Infantry, as prohibited DEI content. • 14 of the 18 articles on government websites about the military service of American baseball star Jackie Robinson were deleted from U.S. government websites. Robinson was drafted in 1942, court-martialed in 1944 for refusing to go to the back of the bus, acquitted, and honorably discharged later the same year. The new URL of one of the articles is tagged "DEI". Press Secretary Ullyot later said, "Everyone at the Defense Department loves Jackie Robinson." A profile of Robinson was restored on March 19. • A photograph of Medal of Honor recipient Harold Gonsalves was removed. • A page about the highly decorated 442nd Infantry Regiment, a segregated Japanese-American unit, was removed. Following a statement of concern by Hawaii Congressman Ed Case, the page was restored on March 14. According to the Japanese-American internment archive and history group Denshō, the regiment is now labeled a "key military unit" and any mention of the race or place of origin of its soldiers and officers has been removed. Denshō executive director Naomi Ostwald Kawamura noted in a statement, "The irony of this revisionist approach is that the 442nd Regimental Combat Team only existed because of race...the government recognized that a Japanese American unit could counter Axis propaganda about U.S. racism and provide a strategic tool for American war efforts by demonstrating America's supposed racial tolerance to the rest of the world. This means that the racial framing of the 442nd is not an incidental part of the story, it is the story. Removing explicit references to race and identity erases the very conditions that led to the unit's formation." Code talkers, including Navajo code talkers enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps in World War II, used their native languages to securely transmit messages during multiple wars. Code Talkers content was incompletely restored by March 20 following a public outcry. Navajo Nation president Buu Nygren reported that "White House officials informed the Navajo Nation that an artificial intelligence-powered automated review process looking for content with DEI initiatives led to the elimination of anything mentioning Navajo." • A news release about a guardsman from South Dakota Army National Guard's 235th Military Police Company receiving a dress-protocol exemption based on his Oglala Sioux heritage was deleted. • Arlington removed links to three modules from the Notable Graves menu of their website (African American History, Hispanic American History, Women's History), links to five modules from Education Themes sections (Civil War, Environment, Medal of Honor, Service Branches, Women's History), and links to two modules on the History of Arlington National Cemetery (Freedman's Village, Section 27). • A profile of Ira Hayes, an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Community who was among those raising the American flag at Iwo Jima, was deleted. • Content about the Tuskegee Airmen was deleted. • A section of Arlington National Cemetery's website on notable graves of Hispanic Americans, including Jose Hector Santa Ana, a great-great-nephew of Mexican General Antonio López de Santa Anna, was removed. • Articles related to the Holocaust were removed, including one about a cadet's experience visiting concentration camps, an article about survivor Kitty Saks, and a page that commemorated Holocaust Remembrance Week. • Pages sharing details about Saleha Jabeen, the first Muslim woman chaplain in the United States Air Force, and Khady Ndiaye, the first Muslim woman chaplain candidate in the United States Army, were deleted and replaced with 404 notices. • Approximately 400 books were removed from the U.S. Naval Academy library due to purported DEI content. The New York Times has contrasted some of the texts that were removed versus retained: Mein Kampf (retained) versus Memorializing the Holocaust (removed), The Bell Curve (retained) versus a book critiquing it (removed). • Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ordered John Phelan, the Secretary of the Navy, to rename the US naval ship Harvey Milk, which was named after Harvey Milk, a gay rights icon and former naval officer. Hegseth reportedly chose to order the renaming during Pride Month on purpose. ==See also==