On Thursday, February 12, New York leaders and activists reinstated a large Pride flag at the Stonewall National Monument flagpole, directly opposing a federal order that only allowed flags of the United States or the Department of the Interior. Despite freezing temperatures, the Trump administration’s actions against this emblem of gay rights in the West Village rallied a crowd at Christopher Park. The crowd, numbering in the hundreds, filled the nearby streets, chanting slogans like, “Whose streets? Our streets! Whose park? Our park!”
The National Park Service (NPS) had discreetly removed the Pride flag earlier that week, coinciding with a year after the erasure of transgender and queer references from its website regarding the 1969 Stonewall Uprising. By Wednesday, a US flag replaced the Pride flag, a move seen as part of the White House’s effort to sanitize American history at national sites. This action quickly provoked backlash from Mayor Zohran Mamdani, Governor Kathy Hochul, and various Democratic officials who pledged the flag’s return. “Our city has a duty not just to honor this legacy, but to live up to it,” Mamdani declared on social media.
Three days post-removal, Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal organized a spontaneous flag-raising event involving numerous Lower Manhattan officials. The plan was to attach the Pride flag to a smaller pole and affix it beside the US flag at Christopher Park. The process proved challenging, with activists voicing frustrations and chanting for proper action. Eventually, the Pride flag was raised alongside the US flag, satisfying the gathered crowd who later moved to the Stonewall Inn.
Bronx trans non-binary artist Timothy French attended with their trans pride flag, expressing that the Trump administration’s actions were disheartening but unsurprising. French highlighted the lack of understanding about trans people outside metropolitan areas, exacerbated by conservative narratives. Previously, the Trans Pride flag sometimes accompanied the rainbow flag at the site, but a mandate last year restricted it to only the rainbow version designed by Gilbert Baker in 1978.
State Senator Erik Bottcher, representing the West Village, emphasized the monument’s significance, recalling his own struggles growing up and how learning about Stonewall offered hope. Hoylman-Sigal assured that any future attempts to remove the flag would be met with resistance. Hyperallergic reached out to the National Park Service for a statement on the matter, and Rhea Nayyar contributed additional reporting.
