A Home lawmaker is urging the fee tasked with scrubbing Accomplice names from U.S. navy bases to rename Fort Benning for Medal of Honor recipient Sgt. 1st Class Alwyn Cashe.
In a letter Wednesday to what’s being informally referred to as the Naming Fee, Rep. Stephanie Murphy, D-Fla., argued that naming the Georgia base after Cashe would “‘appropriately mirror the braveness, values and sacrifices’ of the U.S. navy,” quoting the fee’s standards for selecting new names.
“SFC Cashe is a legend in navy circles, beloved in life and revered in dying, a hero within the purest sense of the time period,” she wrote. “I consider he can be an honorable and unifying selection, and hope you’ll think about recommending him in your report back to Congress.”
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In 2020, Congress created the Naming Fee to rename navy bases and different Protection Division property with Accomplice namesakes amid a nationwide reckoning over race and the legacy of slavery after the police killing of George Floyd.
The fee’s preliminary focus has been on 9 Army bases with Accomplice names: Forts Lee, Hood, Benning, Gordon, Bragg, Polk, Pickett, A.P. Hill and Rucker.
Fort Benning was named in 1922 after Accomplice Brig. Gen. Henry L. Benning, who was a frontrunner of Georgia’s secessionist motion.
Late final 12 months, Cashe turned the primary Black service member from the post-9/11 wars to obtain the Medal of Honor after years of campaigning by relations and lawmakers, together with Murphy.
Cashe died in 2005 after the Bradley Combating Car he was commanding in Iraq was struck by an improvised explosive gadget. He pulled the motive force out of the car regardless of his personal uniform being soaked in gasoline. Whereas he was rescuing the motive force, Cashe’s uniform caught hearth, inflicting burns over most of his physique, however he nonetheless went again to save lots of one other six troopers from the car.
Cashe’s connections to Fort Benning embrace serving as a drill sergeant and a platoon sergeant there.
Murphy is the newest lawmaker to foyer the Naming Fee.
Rep. Donald McEachin, D-Va., and members of the Congressional Black Caucus in October requested for Fort Lee, Virginia, to be renamed in honor of Lt. Gen. Arthur J. Gregg, an Army logistician who rose from personal to change into one of the vital extremely embellished Black officers within the navy.
Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus have additionally referred to as for naming Fort Hood, Texas, after Gen. Richard E. Cavazos, the primary Mexican American four-star common. The caucus had beforehand prompt Fort Hood be named for Grasp Sgt. Roy Benavidez, a Texas native who acquired the Medal of Honor for valor within the Vietnam Battle, however in an August letter stated Benavidez’s background in Special Forces makes him a greater match to be the namesake for Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
The fee additionally solicited names from the general public on-line. Retired Adm. Michelle Howard, the chair of the fee, stated in October that the panel had acquired hundreds of solutions.
The fee’s remaining report is because of Congress this coming October, and the Pentagon should implement its suggestions by Jan. 1, 2024.
— Rebecca Kheel might be reached at rebecca.kheel@navy.com. Comply with her on Twitter @reporterkheel.
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