President Donald Trump signed a proclamation Sunday declaring Feb. 9 as the inaugural “Gulf of America Day.”
While flying over the Gulf of Mexico on his way to the Super Bowl in New Orleans, Trump held a news conference announcing the new honored day and other executive order plans for the week.
“As my Administration restores American pride in the history of American greatness, it is fitting and appropriate for our great Nation to come together and commemorate this momentous occasion and the renaming of the Gulf of America,” Trump stated in the proclamation.
It’s the latest in Trump’s push to rename the body of water between Florida and Texas, though the change could take months to enact.
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Trump pushes to rename the ‘Gulf of Mexico’ to the ‘Gulf of America’
Trump signed an executive order on his first day in office to rename the “Gulf of Mexico” to the “Gulf of America.” The order also reverses an Obama-administration geography name-change by reverting the name of the Alaska mountain “Denali” to “Mount McKinley.”
The process to change a geographic name usually takes at least six months as the U.S. Board on Geographic Names consults with states, tribes, mapmakers and other parties, but Trump’s order called for it to go into effect within 30 days.
Google has said it will update the name on its maps when it has been updated on official government sources.
Other countries aren’t required to recognize the name, but international organizations would need to help mediate the discrepancies.
The moves drew pushback from Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, who argued to Google that the U.S. cannot unilaterally rename the gulf as it is shared with Mexico and Cuba.
