Cape May Coast Guard Swastika Incident Sparks Letter From NJ Democrats

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Congressman Frank Pallone, Jr. is leading New Jersey’s Democratic members of Congress in demanding the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem immediately reverse a weakening of Coast Guard policy. This demand follows the discovery of a swastika drawn on a bathroom wall at the United States Coast Guard Training Center in Cape May.

READ MORE: Swastika Found Drawn On Bathroom Wall At Coast Guard Training Center In Cape May, New Jersey

Lawmakers wrote in a letter to Noem, “We demand that you immediately restore explicit language classifying swastikas as prohibited hate incidents and condemn the use of this heinous symbol at a military facility.”

They also requested that she take steps to reverse what they described as a “culture of hate” developing in the Trump Administration.

The letter from Pallone and other New Jersey congressional members specifically requested that Noem publicly condemn the incident. They urged her to restore explicit language classifying swastikas and other hate symbols as prohibited hate incidents. The lawmakers also called for a reversal of 2025 handbook changes that removed the term “hate incident” from official policy.

Prior to 2025, Coast Guard policy stated that symbols like swastikas, nooses, Confederate flags, supremacist symbols, and antisemitic imagery “would constitute a potential hate incident.” This language was removed and replaced with a description of the same symbols as merely “potentially divisive.”

The delegation warned that downgrading explicit prohibitions sends a signal that consequences are uncertain.

“Words matter. When the Coast Guard’s standard shifted from prohibited hate to something merely ‘divisive,’ the culture inevitably followed,” the delegation said.

In 2024, the Anti-Defamation League recorded 719 antisemitic incidents in New Jersey, with nearly one quarter involving swastikas.

Pallone and his colleagues said that ambiguity around hate symbols inside a military facility undermines discipline, unity, and trust. They are pressing Noem to act immediately and make clear that such symbols are unequivocally banned.

“The United States military has always been one of the few places in our national life where Americans of every race, faith, and background stand shoulder to shoulder, bound not by identity but by shared purpose,” they wrote. “If hate is minimized, if its symbols are softened, we risk eroding that unity from within.”

The letter was signed by Congressman Donald Norcross, Congressman Herbert C. Conaway, Jr., Congressman Josh Gottheimer, Congressman Robert J. Menendez, Congresswoman Nellie Pou, Congresswoman LaMonica McIver and Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman.

You can read the full letter here.