Black Medal of Honor recipient removed from US Defense website in ‘blood-boiling’ DEI purge

A Black soldier, Charles C. Rogers, who was awarded the Medal Of Honor, has been removed from a US Department of Defense website, amid an ongoing purge of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.

The page honouring major general Charles Calvin Rogers, who served during the Vietnam War, now leads to a 404 error message. The URL was also changed, with the word “medal” changed to “DEI medal”.

According to the West Virginia Military Hall of Fame, Charles Rogers was the “highest-ranking African American to receive the Medal of Honor”, the top military decoration that recognises those who have “distinguished themselves by acts of valor”.

Charles Rogers was presented with the Medal of Honor by president Richard Nixon in 1970. He also won the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Legion of Merit and a Purple Heart.

Rogers won the Medal of Honor after being wounded three times while defending a military base. He died in 1990 at the age of 61.

Writer Brandon Friedman claimed on Bluesky on Saturday (15 March) that the webpage had been taken down, in a move he described as “blood-boiling”, adding: “Google his name and when you click, you’ll see the page has been deleted and the URL changed to include ‘DEI medal,’” he wrote.

This is Major General Charles Rogers. He served our nation for over 30 years and was awarded the Medal of Honor for being wounded 3 times while defending a base in Vietnam.

The Trump Administration just removed his story from the DOD website as a part of its anti-DEI efforts. pic.twitter.com/YjHhbpHThy

— Protect Kamala Harris ✊ (@DisavowTrump20) March 16, 2025

After returning to the White House in January, Donald Trump swiftly announced crackdowns on equality programmes, placing government DEI employees on paid leave.

One of the Trump administration’s latest moves in the battle against DEI was the deleting of images on the defence department website of the Enola Gay, the aircraft from which the first atomic bomb was dropped on Japan in 1945.

According to The Associated Press, at least 26,000 images have been flagged for removal. Some of the content selected for deletion includes workers with the surname Gay, as well references to the B-29 super-fortress bomber which was named after its pilot’s mother.

The move follows an executive order signed by Trump aiming to eliminate DEI initiatives from the federal government and the military.

“As chief executive and commander-in-chief, I am committed to meritocracy and to the elimination of race-based and sex-based discrimination within the armed forces of the United States,” Trump proclaimed. “No individual or group within our armed forces should be preferred or disadvantaged on the basis of sex, race, ethnicity, colour or creed.”

The president also signed executive orders declaring the official policy of the US is that there are “only two sexes”, banning transgender men and women from serving in the military and restricting gender-affirming healthcare for trans people under the age 19.

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