Washington D.C. – On Tuesday July 15, 2025, Congresswoman Strickland proposed her amendment to prohibit the use of federal funds to revert recommendations from the Congressionally established Confederate Naming Commission for military bases and honor Confederate leaders.
Strickland’s remarks are transcribed below, and can be viewed here:
Congresswoman Marilyn Strickland: Thank you, Chairman.
In Fiscal Year 2021 NDAA, which covers 2020, this committee created the Commission on the Naming of Items of the Department of Defense that Commemorate the Confederate States of America.
Since the height of the Jim Crow era, our servicemembers – who come from every background and walk of life – have been working and living at installations that honor men who took up arms in rebellion against our country. Fighting to protect the institution of slavery.
This committee put in the work to correct this injustice, and the Naming Commission followed with extensive community engagement, site visits, Congressional briefings, and deliberation.
This Commission specifically rejected proposals to rename bases after servicemembers who share the same names as the Confederate traitors. Now we know politics isn’t about nuance these days, so pay attention to these details.
Instead, this Commission choose to honor a new generation of Army legends including General Richard Cavazos, Lieutenant General Hal Moore, and Dr. Mary Edwards Walker.
Unfortunately, Secretary Hegseth and the Trump Administration decided to troll the American public and discard the hard work of this Committee and the Commission by reverting base names.
And they used the same ploy the Commission rejected – finding new servicemembers who share last names of these Confederate traitors.
These servicemembers are heroes in their own right, and we don’t deny that. Like Private Fitz Lee, a Buffalo Soldier who was awarded the Medal of Honor.
Yet Secretary Hegseth saw them as nothing more than convenient names. Their families were not given the opportunity to weigh in if their legacies should be used this way.
President Trump gave up the ruse last month when he said out loud that Fort Gregg-Adams is being restored to Fort Lee in honor of Robert E. Lee – not Fitz Lee, as the Secretary claimed.
This cynical exercise was done with no input from the communities who collaborated on this important change and stripped away the honor bestowed upon patriots – again, without the input of their descendants.
Secretary Hegseth’s work was so sloppy that my colleagues are now trying to correct his mistakes and offering amendments to again modify individual base names in a way that is less offensive to some families of fallen servicemembers.
In 2020, a bipartisan group of legislators actually overrode Trump’s veto of the NDAA, because he did not want this Commission to exist. So, this was a bipartisan effort.
My amendment simply prevents any funds appropriated to the Department of Defense from being used to contravene or reverse the work of the Naming Commission that was established in 2020. In the spirit of government efficiency, the Department must stop lighting taxpayer money on fire to play games with military history.
I urge my colleagues to please vote YES on this amendment. I yield back.