From a sailor who died in World War II to the current president of the United States, a new U.S. Navy aircraft carrier could be renamed. The White House is facing criticism after reports emerged that the ship, which would honor an African American war hero, might instead bear the name of Donald Trump.
The U.S. Navy had previously announced that the aircraft carrier under construction would be named USS Doris Miller, in honor of a sailor famous for his heroism during the attack on Pearl Harbor in World War II. At that time, the Navy restricted the jobs African Americans could perform, and Miller was a mess attendant at the time of the attack.
Despite the history it carries, the Navy is now working to change the ship’s name, CNN reported citing three sources familiar with the internal discussions. Two of those sources indicated that there have been talks about renaming it to honor Trump, according to the television network.
According to one of the sources, the Navy seeks to assign the name Miller to another warship and is proposing his candidacy for the Medal of Honor, the highest military valor decoration. The final authorization to award this distinction depends on Congress and Trump’s approval.
Efforts to remove the name USS Doris Miller from the ship have been underway since early this year, the sources said. Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao and his team have also been studying updating the official guidelines, which establish the criteria for naming ships.
Amid discussions about the aircraft carrier’s name, the Navy has stopped referring to it internally as USS Doris Miller and uses only its hull number, CVN-81, one of the sources commented. A recent White House executive order on shipbuilding also referred to the ship simply as CVN-81.
The ship is not expected to be delivered until 2034, USNI News first reported, due to shipbuilder constraints.
Active U.S. aircraft carriers usually have three types of names: that of a president, a major battle, or a high-ranking general. For this reason, the appearance of Doris Miller was an important step: it recognized the heroism of a serviceman far from the high ranks, and moreover, because of his skin color.
Among the aircraft carriers named after presidents are the USS Abraham Lincoln, USS George H.W. Bush, USS Ronald Reagan, and USS George Washington. The USS Nimitz, for example, is named after the admiral who commanded the U.S. Pacific Fleet during World War II. The USS Carl Vinson is named after a Georgia congressman who chaired the House Naval Affairs and Armed Services Committee.
Miller, a Navy cook, reportedly shot down between four and six Japanese bombers at Pearl Harbor in 1941, despite having no formal training in the weapons system he used. He died at sea in 1943, along with two-thirds of the crew, after a Japanese torpedo struck the USS Liscome Bay. Cuba Gooding Jr. portrayed him years later in the film Pearl Harbor (2001).
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Doris “Dorie” Miller, from Waco, Texas, enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1939, according to the National Museum of the Pacific War. On the day of the Japanese attack, Miller, then a third-class mess attendant, was collecting dirty laundry when bombs began falling on the U.S. fleet. The mess attendant position was one of the few jobs in the Navy accessible to African American men, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs.
He was awarded the Navy Cross for his actions at Pearl Harbor. The official citation reads: “While at his captain’s side on the bridge of the battleship USS West Virginia, mess attendant Doris Miller, despite enemy machine gun and bombing fire and in the face of a serious fire, helped move his captain, who had suffered mortal wounds, to a safer place, and subsequently took control and operated a machine gun against attacking Japanese aircraft until ordered to leave the bridge.”
The Trump administration has long been embroiled in controversies related to renaming institutions. Last year, there was controversy related to the appearance of Trump’s name at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Last year, the board appointed by the president voted to rename the center as “The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center” and placed Trump’s name on the building’s facade. This measure ended in lawsuits, and the center’s board of trustees was ultimately ordered to remove the current White House occupant’s name.
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has led a “restoration” of names of U.S. Armed Forces bases, as many previously honored Confederate Army officers, the southern side that sought to continue slavery and lost the Civil War in 1865. After those names changed, the current administration’s secretary decided to revert to the old names.
In 2025, in the same direction, he took an unusual step and ordered the Navy Secretary to rename the USNS Harvey Milk, which honored the Navy veteran and gay rights activist.
The choice of USS Doris Miller marked the first time an aircraft carrier would honor an enlisted sailor, and the first to bear the name of an African American.
Then-acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly announced in January 2020 that the new aircraft carrier would bear Miller’s name. The announcement was made during a Martin Luther King Jr. Day ceremony at Pearl Harbor.
When questioned about his decision to name the aircraft carrier after Miller, Modly told CNN that he was recommended by a group of retired black admirals, and that he believes “one of our most powerful warships should bear the name of a sailor like Miller to draw greater attention to what makes our Navy so unique and great.”
“Ultimately, these names are meant to be symbolic and unifying for the Navy and the nation it serves,” Modly told CNN. “When named in honor of people like Doris Miller, they raise awareness of the heroism, patriotism, and sacrifices of all U.S. sailors, not just their commanders.”
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