Sewell calls on Air Force to reinstate Tuskegee Airmen video: ‘not DEI,’ but history

U.S. Rep. Terri Sewell is calling on the U.S. Air Force to reinstate a Tuskegee Airmen history video recently removed from the military instruction curriculum following President Donald Trump’s executive orders banning diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) across the federal government.

“The Tuskegee Airmen bravely fought and died for our freedom before this nation even granted them full benefits of citizenship,” said U.S. Rep. Terri Sewell, D-Birmingham. “To strip them from the Air Force curriculum is an outrageous betrayal of our values as Americans. Their heroism is not ‘DEI.’ It is American history. I’m calling on the Air Force to immediately reverse this decision. We will not let our history be erased.”

Tuskegee Mayor Lawrence Haygood echoed Sewell’s comments, emphasizing that the Tuskegee Airmen’s story is about history, not modern-day DEI politics.

“You cannot ignore history,” Haygood said. “Because of their determination for their country, they fought in exceptional ways, and it’s been recognized worldwide. You cannot hide that. If you change our history, we won’t accept that.”

The video, which describes the exploits of the groundbreaking Black airmen trained in Tuskegee during World War II, was part of a DEI-related course taken during basic military training at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, a hub of Air Force training. Its removal was first reported by the San Antonio Express-News.

The 37th Training Wing in Texas did not respond to a request for comment on Saturday, but The Associated Press, in a separate report, confirmed that courses with those videos had been removed so it can “fully execute and implement all directives outlined” in Trump’s Executive Orders.

Trump, during his inaugural address Monday, vowed to end federal DEI practices, which he alleges are the government’s efforts to “socially engineer race and gender” into public and private lives. He then signed an executive order aimed to dismantle federal DEI programs.

The Tuskegee Airmen story isn’t the only video to be removed by the Air Force. Also removed was a video about the Women Airforce Service Pilots, or WASPs – the female World War II pilots who were vital in ferrying warplanes for the military.

Tuskegee Airmen, known as the “Red Tails,” were the nation’s first Black military pilots who served in a segregated World War II unit. Their all-Black 332nd Fighter Group had one of the lowest loss records of all the bomber escorts in the war.

John Giggie, associate professor of history at the University of Alabama, said the story of the Tuskegee Airmen is vital toward understanding the integration of the U.S. military during World War II.

“The story of the Tuskegee Airmen is rooted in their courage and patriotism to serve their country during World War II despite rules and customs of segregation,” said Giggie. “Their stunning success in air combat helped force the military to revise doctrines that restricted opportunities for Black (soldiers) and lead President Truman in 1948 to implement Executive Order No. 9981, which integrated the U.S. military as a whole and paved the ground for the wider civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s.”

Major James A. Ellison, left, returns the salute of Mac Ross of Dayton, Ohio, as he inspects the cadets at the Basic and Advanced Flying School for Negro Air Corps Cadets in this Jan. 23, 1942 file photo at the Tuskegee Institute in Tuskegee, Ala. Sixty-two years ago, John Allen, Robert Lawrence and James Williams were fighting two battles: one against Nazi Germany, another against racism in the military. (AP Photo/U.S. Army Signal Corps)The Plain Dealer

President George W. Bush awarded the Tuskegee Airmen the Congressional Gold Medal in a ceremony at the Capitol Rotunda in 2007.

Giggie said that people charged with implementing the new federal mandates on DEI have to “carefully consider how to provide to the next generation of airmen a full understanding of the transformational work of the Tuskegee Airmen and inspire them with their heroics and brilliance.”

All of the nearly 1,000 Black military pilots who trained in the U.S. during World War II did so in Tuskegee, a city of about 8,700 residents today that is 87% Black.

The city celebrates the Tuskegee Airmen each year on March 7, as a day of recognition and in celebration of the group’s accomplishments that include inclusivity and a “coming together to make this country strong,” Haygood said.

“Whenever I’m traveling, and I say the ‘City of Tuskegee,” or the ‘Tuskegee Airmen,’ I always get comments from people … they are recognized worldwide for their contributions,” said Haygood, mayor of Tuskegee for the past eight years. “It’s unfortunate they are taking them out of the training that serves as an inspiration for people in the Air Force who are coming in.”

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