Groups sue Trump administration over Pride flag removal at Stonewall

"Civil rights groups are suing the Trump administration after the National Park Service removed the official Pride flag from the Stonewall National Monument in Greenwich Village. The federal lawsuit, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, alleges the removal violates multiple federal laws and policies governing historic preservation and management of national monuments. The litigation comes after the flag's removal earlier this month from the West Village monument commemorating the 1969 uprising, widely considered the birth of the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement."

"The National Park Service replaced the Pride flag with an American flag, saying it was complying with a new federal directive limiting which flags can be flown at national parks. Civil rights groups and local officials, including Mayor Zohran Mamdani, denounced the federal government's actions. Hundreds gathered outside the park last week as elected officials and activists raised an unofficial Pride flag at the site."

""The federal government is attempting to bully and intimidate the LGBTQ+ community the same way that it is attempting to bully and intimidate other minority communities," state Sen. Erik Bottcher, who represents Manhattan's Upper West Side, said in an interview. "We won't stand for it. This lawsuit is part of the effort to push back against injustice. We are not going to stop until we prevail.""

"The suit, which was filed by the Gilbert Baker Foundation, Equality New York, Village Preservation and an individual plaintiff, asks a judge to vacate the removal decision and order the federal government to restore the official, NPS-sanctioned Pride flag. The plaintiffs are represented by Lambda Legal and the Washington Litigation Group. In the complaint, the plaintiffs argue the flag's removal was "arbitrary and capricious" and based on a misreading of the Interior Department's policies that they say expressly permit the display of flags t"

Civil rights groups filed a federal lawsuit after the National Park Service removed the official Pride flag from Stonewall National Monument in Greenwich Village. The complaint, filed in the Southern District of New York, alleges the removal violates federal laws and policies governing historic preservation and management of national monuments. The Park Service replaced the Pride flag with an American flag, citing a new federal directive limiting which flags can be flown at national parks. Local officials and activists denounced the action, gathered at the site and raised an unofficial Pride flag. Plaintiffs ask a judge to vacate the removal and order restoration of the NPS-sanctioned Pride flag and argue the removal was arbitrary and capricious and based on a misreading of Interior Department policies.

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