Fury as Trans and Queer People Erased from Stonewall Monument Website

America’s National Park Service has come under fire for removing references to transgender and queer people from its page for the Stonewall Monument, which commemorates the Stonewall Uprising.

In 2016, President Barack Obama created America’s first LGBTQ+ national monument when he officially proclaimed New York City’s Stonewall Inn, a longstanding LGBTQ+ bar, a national monument.

The location has been described as the birthplace of the LGBTQ+ rights movement after a 1969 police raid on the bar sparked riots by the LGBTQ+ community, inspiring the first Pride marches.

In addition to the bar, the monument includes a small adjacent park known as Christopher Park, as well as the surrounding streets and pavements. The park features a sculpture by George Segal of two same-sex couples, called Gay Liberation.

References to Trans and Queer People Removed

This week, visitors to the monument’s official page discovered that references to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer (LGBTQ+) community had been modified.

Instead, the site now only refers to “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual” and “LGB”. The page also mentions only the “LGB rights movement” and “LGB flags,” effectively erasing the role of transgender and queer people from the Stonewall riots and their inclusion in the LGBTQ+ community.

“I’ve been able to brush off most of the erasure of trans people from government websites, but this one is REALLY getting under my skin. It’s just complete revisionist history. How fucking dare they,” wrote social media commentator Parker Molloy on Bluesky.

Part of Trump’s Anti-Trans Campaign

The move is in response to the Trump administration’s campaign to implement the president’s executive orders that the US government only recognises two genders and to eradicate what he described as ‘gender ideology extremism’.

Trump has also moved to block transgender people from changing gender markers on official documents and has banned transgender people from serving in the military.

“This is just the latest and perhaps most symbolically potent step in the administration’s methodical campaign to eliminate trans people from public life entirely,” Molloy added in a blog article.

Protest at Stonewall Monument

On Friday, protesters gathered outside the Stonewall Inn to condemn the National Park Service’s actions and the alarming war against trans people by the US government. They waved rainbow and trans Pride flags and held up banners stating “Erasure is Annihilation” and “Silence = Death”.

“The trans and drag community have always been part of the LGBTQ+ community, so now for the federal government to try to erase trans from our community makes absolutely no sense,” Steven Love Menendez, a volunteer at the Stonewall Monument, told CNN.

Speaking at the rally, New York City Council member Erik Bottcher asserted:

“We are here to send a message to Donald Trump – we will not let you erase the existence of our trans siblings. We will not let you cleave our community apart and divide us. We are one community, and now is the time for gays and lesbians and cisgender members of our community to stand up against what is happening.”