Progressive vets compare Confederate officers to terrorists in new ad on Army bases

VoteVets, a progressive veterans group, released a new ad Friday targeting President Trump’s refusal to support the renaming of Army bases named after Confederate officers, who it compared to foreign terrorist leaders.

“We’d never name bases after America’s enemies, like Osama bin Laden,” the group tweeted along with the ad. “Why does Donald Trump so desperately want to keep the names of other racist enemies on our Army bases?”

The advertisement reimagines military bases with pretend mock-ups of facilities such as “Camp bin Laden” and “Joint Base Al-Zarqawi.”

The ad says “10 military bases still bear the names of Confederate Army traitors,” listing examples such as Robert E. Lee, George Pickett and others “who took up arms against the United States in defense of slavery.”

The ad says Trump “dishonors our service” when he declared earlier this week that he would never allow the names to be changed, despite the willingness of Pentagon leaders to look at the idea.

Our new ad cuts to the chase, and pulls no punches: We’d never name bases after America’s enemies, like Osama bin Laden. Why does Donald Trump so desperately want to keep the names of other racist enemies on our Army bases? pic.twitter.com/Pfixi2Tu6w

— VoteVets (@votevets) June 12, 2020

Trump tweeted Wednesday that he would “not even consider” renaming the bases, and warned GOP politicians on Thursday not to “fall for” legislative moves to change the names.

Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy and Defense Secretary Mark Esper had announced Monday via an Army spokesperson that they were open to changing the names of the bases, marking a reversal from positions expressed in February.

The removal of Confederate statues and imagery from multiple public spaces comes amid protests against racial injustices and police brutality over the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man from Minneapolis who died in police custody last month after a now-former officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.

Senior members of the Congressional Black Caucus introduced legislation Thursday calling for the removal of Confederate statues from the Capitol, one day after Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said the statues should be removed.

The Marines and the Navy have both within the past week banned the display of the Confederate flag, and statues of figures associated with genocide and slavery have been torn down or defaced in locations such as Belgium and Boston.