Bill would fund grants for removal of Confederate symbols

Rep. Bobby Rush (D-IL) said he will unveil a plan to create a federal grant program for cities, counties, states, tribes, researchers and historical preservation groups to remove, replace and transfer Confederate symbols.

The program, which the National Park Service would run, would provide $15 million annually through 2030, $9 million of which would be reserved for state historic preservation programs to remove, transfer and store Confederate symbols.

Symbols listed under the bill (H.R.8095) include flags, monuments, memorials, statues, structures or signs that honor Confederate soldiers or the Confederacy.

In a statement, Rush said he wanted to provide an incentive for removing Confederate structures, which he called “false idols.”

“It is past time that we eradicate these totems of treason and replace them with symbols that represent the true promise of America, such as the emancipation of Black Americans,” Rush said. “These abhorrent commemorative structures, many of which were created long past the conclusion of the Civil War, are located in areas that far exceed the confines of the 11 Confederate States and are a means to uphold Confederate principles and white supremacy.”

The bill would block use of grant money under the program to restore Confederate symbols or build new ones, and it encourages the construction of new monuments that “commemorate or depict the freedom of enslaved African Americans.”

Rush’s bill is the latest foray from Congress over Confederate symbols and their place in American life.

President Donald Trump has welded himself to the cause of protecting Confederate monuments, such as statues of Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson and Robert E. Lee, and his administration has taken a hard line against protestors who try to topple monuments on federal land.

The Trump administration opposes a broad provision of a House spending bill (H.R.7608) that would remove “from display all physical Confederate commemorative works” across National Park Service sites.

After white nationalists marched openly in 2017 at the University of Virginia, shouting racist and anti-Semitic phrases and evoking images of Nazi-era youth marches in the 1930s, Trump said he was “sad” at the removal of statues of Lee and Jackson, both Confederate commanders.

Trump opposes a separate provision in the annual defense authorization legislation to rename 10 military bases named after Confederates, though that proposal has bipartisan support.

There are more than 1,700 Confederate symbols, locations and monuments nationwide, according to the Montgomery, Ala.-based Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups.

After protests against police violence swept the U.S. following the May 25 police killing of George Floyd, a Black man in Minnesota, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., ordered the removal from the Capitol of four portraits of former speakers who were part of the Confederacy.

Separately, a spending bill (H.R.7611) for the federal government’s operations would remove Confederate statues and busts from Capitol grounds. And Natural Resources Democrats are pushing their own bills on the topic.

One piece of legislation (H.R.970) from Rep. Anthony Brown, D-Md., would remove a privately funded statue of Lee in Maryland at the Antietam battlefield. The Interior Department acquired the land and statue, which is historically inaccurate. It depicts Lee on horseback, though Lee fought that campaign of the war carried in a wagon due to an injury.

Another bill (H.R.7550), from Rep. Donald McEachin, D-Va., would inventory Confederate monuments under the jurisdiction of the departments of Defense, Interior and Veterans Affairs.