Coast Guard Investigates Hate Symbol Found at New Jersey Training Facility

The U.S. Coast Guard has launched an investigation after a swastika was discovered drawn on a bathroom wall at their primary recruit training center in Cape May, New Jersey. The hate symbol was immediately removed and Coast Guard leadership addressed nearly 900 recruits and staff about the incident.

The U.S. Coast Guard has initiated a formal investigation after discovering a hate symbol at their main recruit training facility in Cape May, New Jersey, officials announced Monday.

A swastika was found drawn on a men’s restroom wall at Training Center Cape May last Thursday evening by a Coast Guard instructor, according to reports from The Washington Post.

“Following discovery of a hate symbol drawn on a bathroom wall in a building at Training Center Cape May, the Coast Guard immediately referred the matter to the Coast Guard Investigative Service (CGIS) for investigation – consistent with longstanding Coast Guard policy,” a Coast Guard spokesperson stated. “This hate symbol was immediately removed.”

Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Kevin Lunday made a trip to the training center to personally address the situation, speaking directly to approximately 900 recruits and staff members about the incident.

“Anyone who adheres to or advances hate or extremist ideology – get out. Leave. You don’t belong in the United States Coast Guard and we reject you,” Lunday declared in an official statement released by the service.

The swastika, which was used by Nazi Germany and has become associated with white supremacist movements and far-right extremism, represents the type of hate symbolism the Coast Guard says it will not tolerate.

Civil rights organizations have pointed to President Donald Trump’s political influence as contributing to increased white supremacist and far-right messaging in recent years, though Trump has publicly stated his condemnation of white supremacists and neo-Nazis.

This incident comes after The Washington Post reported last November that the Coast Guard had modified language in its workplace harassment guidelines, changing how swastikas were described from “hate symbols” to “potentially divisive.”

At that time, Lunday firmly rejected suggestions that the Coast Guard was softening its stance, stating that “claims that the U.S. Coast Guard will no longer classify swastikas, nooses or other extremist imagery as prohibited symbols are categorically false.”