President Donald Trump celebrated his first flight over the recently renamed Gulf of America as his administration continues to take steps to rebrand the body of water long known as the Gulf of Mexico.
In a presidential proclamation published Sunday, Trump recognized Feb. 9 as “Gulf of America Day.” The declaration came as Trump traveled to Super Bowl LIX in New Orleans, Louisiana.
An executive order Trump signed on his first day in office ordered the U.S. Secretary of the Interior to “take all appropriate actions to rename as ‘the Gulf of America’ the U.S. Continental Shelf area bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the State of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida and extending to the seaward boundary with Mexico and Cuba in the area formerly named as the Gulf of Mexico.”
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In the Jan. 20 executive order, Trump said the gulf is “an integral asset to our once burgeoning Nation” that has “remained an indelible part of America.”
Highlighting his trip to New Orleans as his “first visit to the Gulf of America since its renaming,” Trump cited the occasion as an opportunity “for our great Nation to come together and commemorate this momentous occasion and the renaming of the Gulf of America.”
Trump urged “public officials and all the people of the United States to observe “Gulf of America Day” with “appropriate programs, ceremonies, and activities.”
Trump signed the proclamation aboard Air Force One Sunday as it flew over the body of water alongside Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum and a map of the U.S. labeling the body of water as the “Gulf of America.”
Burgum said he directed “the U.S. Geologic Survey, who is responsible for the database, which is the Geographic Names Informational System,” to start referring to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.
“Our team is calling all the map providers — so Google Maps, Apple Maps, all the map people,” he added. “That change will take effect this afternoon to Gulf of America.”
As of Monday afternoon, both Google Maps and Apple Maps still refer to the Gulf of America as the Gulf of Mexico. The Associated Press will continue to refer to the water body as the Gulf of Mexico while recognizing the name Trump has chosen. International bodies and other countries do not have to recognize the name change.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said during a speech on the U.S. Senate Floor last month that he “would agree to work with Donald Trump on renaming the Gulf of Mexico only if he first agrees to work with [Democrats] on an actual plan to lower costs for Americans.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., introduced a bill last month that orders “any reference in a law, map, regulation, document, paper, or other record of the United States to the Gulf of Mexico” to “be deemed to be a reference to the ‘Gulf of America.'”
The measure also directs the head of each federal agency to “update each document and map of the Federal agency in accordance with the renaming.” As of Monday, Greene’s legislation has secured the support of 15 cosponsors, all Republicans.
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
