The U.S. Department of the Interior (DoI) on Friday said that the Gulf of Mexico is now to be known as the “Gulf of America” following an executive order by U.S. President Donald Trump.
On Monday, Trump issued an order saying that the body of water on the south coast of the U.S. and east coast of Mexico would be renamed in honour of “American greatness.”
The name Gulf of Mexico has been in use since the 16th century.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum on Tuesday said that “for us it will continue to be the Gulf of Mexico and for the entire world it will continue to be the Gulf of Mexico.”
The DoI also said that North America’s highest mountain, Denali, was also to change name and would now be known by its previous moniker of Mount McKinley.
The mountain had been officially renamed, at the request of the state of Alaska after years of dispute, in 2015 under then U.S. president Barack Obama.
The name change was a sign of cultural sensitivity towards the Indigenous population of Alaska, for whom the mountain has had a special significance for centuries.
The 2015 order changing the mountain’s name to Denali notes that William McKinley, a former U.S. president from Ohio, “never visited, nor did he have any significant historical connection to, the mountain or Alaska.”
The DoI said that the “name restorations … honor the legacy of American greatness,” echoing Trump’s order.
“These changes reaffirm the nation’s commitment to preserving the extraordinary heritage of the United States and ensuring that future generations of Americans celebrate the legacy of its heroes and historic assets,” the statement continued.
The DoI said that the U.S. Board on Geographic Names was “working expeditiously to update the official federal nomenclature in the Geographic Names Information System to reflect these changes, effective immediately for federal use.”
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