Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell does not oppose renaming U.S. military bases to erase associations with Confederate officers, he told reporters Tuesday.
McConnell, a Kentucky Republican and descendant of a Confederate soldier, declined to comment on President Trump’s threat to veto an upcoming Defense Department spending authorization bill if it includes a provision to rename several bases named after Confederate officers.
“If it’s appropriate to take another look at these names, I’m personally OK with that,” McConnell told reporters after a closed-door luncheon with fellow Republicans.
McConnell said he is opposed to removing Confederate statues from the Capitol, however. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has called on the committee overseeing the National Statuary Hall to remove 11 Confederate figures and may call up a House bill that would also require their removal.
McConnell said Pelosi’s demand “is clearly a bridge too far” and would amount to “airbrushing the Capitol to crop out everybody who had any connection to slavery.”
Eight presidents owned slaves, including Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, whose statues are located in the Capitol rotunda.
The Republican-led Armed Services Committee last week approved an amendment authored by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, to remove Confederate names from military bases and other Department of Defense facilities.
The Senate may take up the Defense Department bill in the coming weeks, and the amendment will get a vote on the Senate floor.
“What is ultimately decided on, I don’t have a problem with,” McConnell said.
McConnell said his father was posted at Fort Gordon in Augusta, Georgia, following his service in World War II. McConnell said nobody was aware the base was named after John Brown Gordon, a major general in the Confederate Army.
McConnell declined to comment on Trump’s opposition to changing the names of the bases.
“I’m giving you my opinion,” McConnell said.
