U.S. Defense Department webpage on Jackie Robinson’s military service suddenly missing amid DEI purge

Baseball Player Jackie Robinson with the Montreal Royals club at Sanford, Fla., March 4, 1946. (AP Photo/Bill Chaplis, File)

A U.S. Department of Defense webpage describing baseball and civil rights icon Jackie Robinson’s military service was missing Wednesday morning.

That development comes after pages honoring a Black Medal of Honor winner and Japanese American service members were taken down — the Pentagon said that was a mistake — amid the department’s campaign to strip out content singling out the contributions by women and minority groups, which the Trump administration considers “DEI.”

According to Internet Archive, the page on Robinson previously included biographical information about his Army service during World War II, which occurred prior to his famously breaking baseball’s color barrier in 1947 with the Brooklyn Dodgers. When that page’s address was entered Wednesday, a message showed up saying it “might have been moved, renamed, or may be temporarily unavailable.” The letters “dei” were also automatically added to the URL.

The page included an anecdote about Robinson refusing to move to the back of an Army bus in 1944, prompting the driver to call military police. Robinson was court martialed but acquitted.

Thousands of pages honoring contributions by women and minority groups have been taken down in efforts to delete material promoting diversity, equity and inclusion. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell defended the practice at a briefing Monday.

A Defense Department webpage honoring Black Medal of Honor recipient Army Maj. Gen. Charles Calvin Rogers was taken down last week but was back online by Monday night.

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The Associated Press