According to archives reviewed by theGrio, the page honoring Army Maj. Gen. Charles Rogers was removed and altered on Saturday and was reinstated on Monday following public blowback.
The U.S. Department of Defense removed a webpage dedicated to a decorated Black veteran who served in the Vietnam War, characterizing his Medal of Honor as a “DEI” medal, only to later reinstate the page after online fury. The page in question spotlighted Army Maj. General Charles Calvin Rogers, who received the Presidential Medal of Honor from President Richard Nixon in 1970. According to the 2021 Defense article spotlight, Rogers remains the highest-ranking Black American to receive the prestigious Medal of Honor.
However, despite Gen. Rogers’ historic profile, the Defense Department took down the page dedicated to the Black veteran–showing only a “404 page not found” message–and changed the URL to read “deimedal,” according to screenshots and internet archives of the page reviewed by theGrio. It appears the page may have been taken down as a result of President Donald Trump’s executive order abolishing diversity, equity and inclusion throughout the U.S. military as part of his broader anti-DEI agenda across the entire federal government.
According to archives reviewed by theGrio, the page honoring Gen. Rogers appeared to have been removed and altered on Saturday and was reinstated on Monday following public blowback. The Defense Department did not immediately reply to a request for comment from theGrio.
“Trump’s intent to impose a neo-segregationist agenda is reliant on purging and re-constituting the role of Black Americans in our nation’s military,” Richard Brookshire, co-CEO of Black Veterans Project, told theGrio.
“The full throttled attack of Black leadership, dismantling of civil rights protections, imposition of unjust anti-DEI regulations, and unprecedented historical erasure across the Department of Defense is a clear sign of a new Jim Crow being propagated by our Commander in Chief.”
Rogers, born in a segregated America in 1929, entered the U.S. Army just before the military was desegregated. Throughout the early 1950s and 60s, he worked his way up the ranks, becoming a major. Later, he trained an artillery unit and earned his first battalion command at Fort Lewis in Washington.
According to the Defense Department, Rogers was placed in command of the 1st Battalion, 5th Artillery, 1st Infantry Division. In July 1967, he was sent to Vietnam, where he spent two years on the battlefront. When Rogers’ battalion was attacked by the North Vietnamese Army on Oct. 31, 1968, Maj. Gen. Rogers led the soldiers in battle. Despite being wounded during the battle, he continued fighting and killed several enemy soldiers in the process.
The battalion was eventually successful in beating back the incursion; however, two other attacks from different lines of defense occurred. Rogers was injured for a third time and was ultimately unable to continue fighting but continued to direct and encourage his unit. Twelve U.S. soldiers were killed, and dozens more were wounded in the battle; however, Army records show that the casualties on the enemy’s side were significantly higher.
Rogers’ wounds were eventually treated, and he returned to the U.S. in August 1969. The following year, on May 14, 1970, he received the Medal of Honor from President Nixon during a White House ceremony. He continued to serve in the Army, commanding more units and serving in high-level leadership assignments. After 32 years of service, Gen. Rogers retired in 1984 as a major general.
When he returned to civilian life, Rogers was ordained as a Baptist minister and lived in Germany. He later died of prostate cancer on Sept. 21, 1990, at 61. His remains were buried in the Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.
Since taking office, President Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have decried diversity in the U.S. military and vowed to return the Armed Services to a culture of “merit-based” service. Last month, President Trump fired Gen. Charles “CQ” Brown Jr. as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Brown was praised by Trump in 2020 when he named him as chief of the U.S. Air Force.
When asked why President Trump fired Gen. Brown, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Brown was “doing a bad job.”
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