The settlement in Gilbert Baker Foundation v. U.S. Department of the Interior, No. 26 Civ. 1317 (S.D.N.Y.), resolves a two-month-old lawsuit that accused the National Park Service of unlawfully stripping the flag from Stonewall National Monument. Under the proposed terms filed for approval before U.S. District Judge Jennifer Rochon, the Pride flag would fly below the U.S. flag and above the park service flag on the monument's official flagpole. The settlement provides that the court would retain jurisdiction to enforce the agreement.
The flag may be removed only for maintenance or other practical purposes.
The Gilbert Baker Foundation, Village Preservation, Equality New York, and Charles Beal filed the underlying complaint on February 17, roughly a week after NPS removed the flag on or about February 9. The suit advanced a straightforward Administrative Procedure Act theory: the removal was arbitrary and capricious because the government's own presidential proclamation, monument foundation documents, and NPS policy already authorized flags that provide historical context at a site -- and the Pride flag plainly does so at a monument created to commemorate LGBTQ+ history.
The complaint also alleged violations of consultation requirements under the National Historic Preservation Act and sought declaratory relief.
Lambda Legal, which represented the plaintiffs, called the result a vindication. "Today, the government has pledged to restore this important symbol back to where it belongs," the organization said in an announcement Monday.
The settlement marks a rare federal-court retreat for the Trump administration in its broader campaign against DEI-related symbols and messaging. Stonewall, designated a national monument in 2016, is the only U.S. national monument dedicated to LGBTQ+ rights, and the case put the government in the position of defending the removal of a historical marker from the very site Congress and a prior administration chose to preserve.
The case moved fast by federal-litigation standards: complaint to proposed settlement in under two months.