Senators want answers from Coast Guard on how it probes displays of swastikas or other hate symbols

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two senators who lead a bipartisan antisemitism task force said Friday they want more information from the U.S. Coast Guard about how it will investigate incidents of swastikas, nooses or other hate symbols being displayed in its ranks.

The Coast Guard late Thursday released a new, firmer policy addressing the display of such hate symbols, just hours after it was publicly revealed that an emerging policy would have loosened the language to describe them only as “potentially divisive.” That had drawn a swift outcry from Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., and other lawmakers.

Rosen and Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., sent a letter on Friday to Adm. Kevin Lunday, the acting commandant of the Coast Guard, who had released the memo late Thursday to make clear that “hate symbols and flags are prohibited.”

The senators, who said they spoke to Lunday on Thursday, called the new policy a “step in the right direction to affirm the Coast Guard’s commitment to maintaining a safe and inclusive environment for all its members.”

However, the senators indicated they still had questions about how commanding officers or supervisors would look into such incidents under the new policy. Specifically, they asked Lunday for more information about why his memo called for supervisors to “inquire” rather than conduct an investigation, as had been the course of action under previous 2023 and 2019 policies.

“Any inquiry regarding conduct involving imagery historically associated with genocide, terror, and racial subjugation must, at a minimum, be full and transparent to ensure the civil rights of those impacted are protected and conducted in a manner in which victims feel safe to report these incidents,” they wrote.

“Additionally, we would like to better understand the rationale for why the inquiry process was deemed to be preferable to the investigative process,” the senators wrote.

The earlier version had called symbols like swastikas and nooses “potentially divisive” and stopped short of banning them, instead saying that commanders could take steps to remove them from public view and that the rule did not apply to private spaces, such as family housing.

This was a shift from a years-long policy that said such symbols were “widely identified with oppression or hatred” and called their display “a potential hate incident.”

Rosen quickly spoke out about the shift Thursday and warned that “relaxing policies aimed at fighting hate crimes not only sends the wrong message to the men and women of our Coast Guard, but it puts their safety at risk.”

Lunday reached out to Rosen on Thursday and the two spoke later that evening, before he sent out the new memo, according to a person familiar with the situation who was granted anonymity to discuss the private conversation.

In his late-night memo, Lunday wrote: “Divisive or hate symbols and flags are prohibited.” He specified that these include “a noose, a swastika, and any symbols or flags co-opted or adopted by hate-based groups.”