Memorial Day Isn’t Being Changed to George Floyd Day
The Claim
Representative Maxine Waters introduced legislation to rename Memorial Day George Floyd Day.
News posted on
Emerging story
The claim took off on social media in the days leading up to Memorial Day 2021.
Misbar’s Analysis
Misbar’s investigation found that Waters has not introduced any legislation seeking to rename Memorial Day. The topic does not appear in her list of sponsored or cosponsored legislation.
Along with 199 other representatives, Waters did cosponsor the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021, which increases police accountability and “establishes a framework to prevent and remedy racial profiling by law enforcement at the federal, state, and local levels.” The bill is one of two pieces of legislation, along with the George Floyd Law Enforcement Trust and Integrity Act, that responds directly to the killing of George Floyd.
A few pieces of legislation have been recently introduced regarding Memorial Day, but none of them have to do with renaming the holiday or George Floyd.
Memorial Day is meant to honor fallen members of the U.S. military. In 1968, Congress passed legislation to establish Memorial Day as the last Monday in May.
Since there is no legislation to rename Memorial Day, we rate this claim as false.
