Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has called for the removal of 11 statues that depict Confederate soldiers from the US Capitol Building.
In a letter she wrote to Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) and Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), the chair and vice chair of the Joint Committee on the Library, Pelosi requested that they “immediately take steps to remove these 11 statues from display in the United States Capitol.”
“As I have said before, the halls of Congress are the very heart of our democracy. The statues in the Capitol should embody our highest ideals as Americans, expressing who we are and who we aspire to be as a nation,” the California Democrat said.
“While I believe it is imperative that we never forget our history lest we repeat it, I also believe that there is no room for celebrating the violent bigotry of the men of the Confederacy in the hallowed halls of the United States Capitol or in places of honor across the country.”
Read my letter here: https://t.co/lx0nuYxrfk
— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) June 10, 2020
The congressional committee is in charge of the placement of statues in the National Statuary Hall Collection.
Pelosi’s move followed the nationwide protests against racial injustice in response to the killing of George Floyd, a 46-year-old African American, in police custody.
President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he was against the idea of renaming military bases named after Confederate leaders. Pentagon, on the other hand, recently said it would be open to discussing it.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1270787978626052096?s=20
Last week, Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson announced that the city’s landmark statue of a Confederate soldier, known as Appomattox, was removed from Old Town in the wake of the demonstrations for racial justice in the city and around the US.
Old Town Alexandria Does Away With Statue of Confederate Soldier