Some local officials are pledging to restore the Stonewall National Monument’s large Pride flag after a Trump administration directive this week removed it from the only national park site dedicated to LGBTQ+ history.

Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal shared a photo of the bare flagpole at the West Village park on social media Monday evening, along with a screenshot of the U.S. Department of the Interior memo to the National Park Service that led to its removal.

The federal directive states that in most cases, the National Park Service can only fly the U.S. flag, the Department of the Interior flag and the Prisoners of War flag in the public spaces it maintains. The policy makes limited exemptions, such as when a flag would “provide historical context” to a site, or when a site is co-managed with another entity “that may fly that state’s or city’s relevant flag.” But the parks service said in a statement that “changes to flag displays are made to ensure consistency with that guidance.”

In an interview on WNYC’s "Morning Edition," Hoylman-Sigal said protests are being organized for Tuesday, with plans to fly the flag again as soon as Thursday.

“ We would take every step to ensure that our community is safe and we're working closely with other elected officials, the local councilmember, assemblymember and member of Congress,” Hoylman-Sigal said when asked whether he was worried about consequences for protesting the Trump administration. “This is a moment that I think represents a real test of our community's resolve.”

Other local officials have also weighed in. State Sen. Erik Bottcher said on X that “we will not be erased, we will not be silenced, and the Pride flag will fly again.” And in a statement on Monday, U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer said it was “a deeply outrageous action that must be reversed right now,” and “that flag will return.”

Mayor Zohran Mamadani and Council Speaker Julie Menin were less defiant in their statements, in which they opposed the flag's removal but did not specifically say they’ll put it back up. Mamdani said he was “outraged” by the flag’s removal in a post on Tuesday. Menin called the removal of the flag “an attack on LGBTQ+ New Yorkers” and said “we will not stand for it.”

Menin also co-signed a letter along with co-chairs of the City Council’s LGBTQIA+ Caucus to Jessica Bowron, the acting director of the National Parks Service, urging the agency to immediately return the flag to the monument.

“Stonewall is a sacred ground in the history of civil rights in our country. The events that took place there catalyzed a global movement for dignity, equality and freedom — guiding principles upon which our nation was founded,” the letter reads. “The Pride flag has long flown as a symbol of that struggle and of the resilience of a community that continues to fight for its basic rights.”

The 2016 designation by the Obama administration was celebrated by the community at the time, said Sam Biederman, who was the city parks department’s chief of staff at the time.

In 2017, during the first Trump administration, the Parks Service installed a Pride flag on an existing pole at a sidewalk at the corner of the park. But the NPS ultimately took that flag down and pulled out of a dedication ceremony, saying that even though the federal agency had been maintaining that flagpole, it was actually on city land, the Associated Press reported at thew time.

The NPS instead transferred the flag to the city, which went on with the flag dedication and which continues to fly a rainbow flag at the pole. Activists at the time criticized the Parks Service as not wanting to acknowledge the LGBTQ community on federal property, but the service denied any slight was intended, according to the AP report.

“That first Trump administration … had people in it who were capable of being shamed and feeling remorse, and this one doesn't seem to have that,” Biederman said. “We were able to put up enough of a fight and present a plausible enough administrative barrier to the removal of the flag that, my read on it was, the federal administration said, ‘Oh forget it. We’re not having this fight.’”

Then, in 2022, during the Biden administration, the Parks Service installed its own Pride flag inside the park — the first such “permanent” flag on federal land. That’s the one removed this week.

“This is a different kind of Trump administration,” Biederman said.

Last year, the Trump administration erased references to trans people from the Stonewall National Monument webpage, sparking public outcry. The site currently references “lesbian, gay, bisexual” people, without mentioning trans people or using the term “queer” more broadly, on its pages describing the monument’s history.

The NEW Pride Agenda advocacy organization described the removal of the flag as a continuation of administration efforts to “whitewash Stonewall,” in a statement Tuesday, citing the prior removal of mentions of trans people.

“This is a deliberate, strategic campaign to erase us,” the group's director Kei Williams said in the statement.

Biederman, now a consultant, said he hopes to see local officials put up a fight to keep the flag up.

“ Parks and public spaces are where we all meet as equals,” he said. “So it really matters what things are named and what flags are there, and what monuments appear, and how they appear and how they're cared for, and what history we're honoring and remembering.”

Clarification: More information has been added to this story to clarify the history of Pride flags at the Stonewall site.