Transcript of Pentagon’s DEI purge removes historic photos

We're going to turn the Pentagon in the drive of the Trump administration to eliminate not just any efforts to promote diversity in the US armed forces, but eliminate even any mention of diversity. At the end of January, the new Secretary of Defense, as you know, issued a press release with the headline Identity Month's Dead at DOD, banning any official recognition of Black History Month or any other minority groups in the military. But that, it seems, was just the start. Last week, the Pentagon ordered the removal from its websites any mention, photographs or videos that, quote, Promote diversity, equity, and inclusion. Now, according to the Associated Press, more than 26,000 images, photographs, have since been flagged for removal across all military branches. Unclear why this is a controversial photo, but it was flagged. It's a photo of an American hero, private first class Harold Gonsalves, who was born into a Mexican-American family in California. He won the Medal of Honor for his heroic actions during the Battle of Okinawa in 1945. This photo showing black military personnel undergoing training at an Air Air Force base in Illinois during the Second World War. That was flagged for removal.

Perhaps it won't be mentioned any longer in the official histories, the Defense Department, but lest we forget, the US military was segregated until 1948. During World War II, black men and women served in all branches of the armed forces while they were facing racism and segregation. It wasn't until 1948 that President Harry S. Truman signed an executive order banning segregation. Here's another photo, apparently flagged for removal. Air Force Staff Sergeant Christina Scales in 2009. That's when the photo was taken. She's performing a pre-flight check before departing on a mission in a C-17. Why this photo is worthy of purging from the Pentagon's public records is unclear. Apparently, anything related to gay service members is now also to be purged, including this photo of the B-29 aircraft that dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, August sixth, 1945. Now, why would an aircraft be flagged for removal? It appears because the name of the plane is the Enola Gay. It was named after the pilot's mom, Enola Gay Tibbets. But the mere mention of the word gay has someone in the administration clutching at the pearls.