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Interior Secretary David Bernhardt fired back at Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser on “ The Story” Wednesday after a commission sanctioned by her workplace targeted numerous federal monoliths to “get rid of, transfer, or contextualize.”
” My very first thought is that no one– no one– will be eliminating or renaming the Washington Monolith or the Jefferson Memorial,” Bernhardt told host Martha MacCallum. ” None of that is going to occur. It’s just merely nutty.”
The list includes monuments and buildings called after historic figures like former presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Zachary Taylor and Woodrow Wilson. The list likewise includes Founding Dads Benjamin Franklin and George Mason, creator Alexander Graham Bell and “Star-Spangled Banner” author Francis Scott Key.
Taking the example of the Jefferson Memorial, Bernhardt told MacCallum that nobody is calling Jefferson or anybody else a “best person,” however “the Jefferson Memorial specifically was promoted by Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and he was really the main driver behind the production of that fantastic memorial.
” And as you stroll into it and you see the preamble to the Statement of Self-reliance and other terrific things, I believe that offers you an excellent sense of what American exceptionalism is about,” he included.
Bernhardt likewise took problem Wednesday with Bowser’s claim that the federal prosecutor’s workplace in the District is not being difficult enough when it concerns bringing charges against left-wing activists who have been arrested for supposedly dedicating violence throughout demonstrations.
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” They [the D.C. U.S. Attorney’s Office] reacted to that letter with a quite strong letter of their own, which lays out that they’ve been prosecuting folks quite religiously,” he said. ” And I will tell you this, we have our own officers [at the Interior Department] that have actually dealt with these matters and the U.S. Department of Justice is providing us a lot of assistance.
” So the bottom line is, if you devote a criminal activity at Interior-managed residential or commercial properties, we’re going to examine that criminal offense, we are going to prosecute that criminal activity, and if you are convicted, you’re going to go away for a long time for that criminal activity.”
