President Donald Trump’s executive order to rename the Gulf of Mexico has left residents along the Gulf Coast sharply divided. Some say it awakens their pride in the U.S. while others suggest it’s a silly distraction.
The order, which Trump signed Monday night, his first day in office, directs the secretary of the Interior Department to take all the needed steps to change the name to “Gulf of America” within 30 days.
The order says in part that the Gulf plays “a pivotal role in shaping America’s future and the global economy, and in recognition of this flourishing economic resource and its critical importance to our Nation’s economy and its people, I am directing that it officially be renamed the Gulf of America.”
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has already embraced the change. He cited the new name in an executive order earlier this week attributing inclement winter weather to a “low pressure moving across the Gulf of America.”
Cedar Key, a quaint fishing town in Levy County, is a cluster of islands that extend about three miles into the Gulf of Mexico from Florida’s mainland. One resident for more than a decade, 78-year-old Air Force retiree Thomas McKee, said he sees no reason for changing the name.
“Donald Trump is just blowing his horn again,” he said.
McKee, who isn’t registered with a political party, said he thinks many residents will continue to use the Gulf’s original name, which dates at least to the late 1600s. “It’s been too long the Gulf of Mexico to be all of a sudden known as the Gulf of America,” he said.
Amy Henderson, a Cedar Key resident and registered Republican who owns a gift shop and hotel overlooking the Gulf, was initially surprised by Trump’s proposal. Her first thought, however, was practical: “I would have to change a lot of T-shirt designs.”
But, she added, “Anything that shows pride for America, I am 100% for.”
Others questioned whether Trump has the authority to rename the Gulf.
“I don’t want to appear stupid, but I don’t know who owns the Gulf of Mexico,” said Hal Hodges, a 76-year-old Cedar Key carpenter.
Cuba, Mexico and the United States share jurisdiction over the Gulf. The United States’ chunk spans 12 nautical miles from its coastline, according to the National Centers for Environmental Information, a federal agency whose own maps this week still showed the name as the Gulf of Mexico.
Hodges, who has lived in Cedar Key for the past seven years, voted for Trump in 2016, hopeful that he would undertake sweeping political reforms. Feeling that Trump became part of the political establishment instead of remaking it, Hodges didn’t vote last November.
Trump’s history of making bold statements makes it hard to tell if he is serious about the renaming, Hodges said.
“I don’t want to say I don’t take it seriously, but that’s my reaction to the whole thing,” he said. “Trump leads with these things and you never know which thing he’s serious about.”
Persuading other countries to change their maps to say Gulf of America is unlikely. The International Hydrographic Organization, one organization that standardizes what countries call international waters, has not updated its list of names since 1953, IHO spokesperson Sarah Jones Couture wrote in an emailed statement. Even with updates, the IHO has no power to enforce name changes.
“To date, there is no formal agreement or protocol governing the naming of maritime zones,” she wrote.
The order Trump signed instructs the Interior Department to update the Geographic Names Information System to reflect the renaming of the Gulf and remove all references to the Gulf of Mexico. It says all federal references to the Gulf of America, including on agency maps, contracts, and other documents and communications shall reflect the renaming.
The U.S. Board on Geographic Names is an obscure government department that decides what the country calls geographic features. The board's Foreign Names Committee standardizes the names of high seas – or water bodies that touch multiple countries. Most recently, the Foreign Names Committee renamed the capital of Maldives from Male to Malé, according to its meeting minutes.
Trump’s order seeks to have his administration take full control of the board within seven days, possibly by replacing members. The order notes that congressional action is required to establish the board’s renaming in law.
There are major roadblocks to renaming the Gulf of Mexico, according to Leo Dillon, the former chair of the Foreign Names Committee. He said that the committee’s procedures allow only one name for high seas and it usually reflects the most commonly used name.“Anything other than ‘Gulf of Mexico’ has not been in regular use, so it would likely be rejected,” he said. “I think anyone trying to change that would know it.”
Chris Wilkins, a 55-year-old Crystal River resident, a registered Republican and captain for a commercial fishing business, Cool Change Fishing Charters, said he likes how patriotic the Gulf of America sounds.
“I think it’s a much more appropriate name,” Wilkins said, adding that the Gulf “encompasses the coast of America – a whole lot more than Mexico.”
A little less than half the Gulf coastline runs along the United States, or about 1,631 miles, compared to the slightly longer coastline along Mexico, according to government scientists.
The closest historical comparison comes from 2015, Dillon said, when then-President Barack Obama renamed Mount McKinley – an Alaskan mountain range with the highest peak in the country – to Denali, the name that had been used by Alaska’s Indigenous Koyukon people.
The Obama administration cited a 1947 law to rename the range, as did Trump, which says the secretary of the interior can decide names when the U.S. Board on Geographic Names does not act “within a reasonable time.”
The Denali decision, which Trump also changed Monday back to Mount McKinley in the same Executive Order as the Gulf, still differs from renaming the Gulf of Mexico in one key way: Denali is exclusively United States territory.
Nonetheless, renaming can have a symbolic impact, said University of Florida geography professor Mark Fenster.“It's part of a broader set of either recognizing the historical authority of native populations in Alaska or, being nationalistic in the way President Trump is,” he said. "The problem with changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico is that the Gulf of Mexico doesn't belong to us.”
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum sarcastically responded when Trump raised the name change recently in a televised press conference by suggesting renaming North America to “América Mexicana.”
For Cedar Key’s mayor, Sue Colson, the name change is a distraction from the country’s aftermath of natural disasters – including three major hurricanes recently that hit her town in a span of just 13 months. She offered a different moniker for the Gulf instead, an homage to a popular seafood harvested in the shallow waters nearby.
“I prefer it to be the Gulf of Clam,” she said. “I’m serious. If we’re going to do it, then everybody’s going to call it what they want.”
Some anglers worry about the process’s logistical issues rather than its implications.
Jerome Young is executive director of the Florida Keys Commercial Fishermen’s Association, which represents a large swath of commercial fishermen in the Keys on the state and federal level to protect and promote their industry.
He worried about the potential costs of the name change. He said some databases could be updated digitally, but physical maps would have to be reprinted. He also said the move appeals to his patriotism.
“I think that we probably do most of the regulation in the Gulf, so why not?” Young said.
John Underwood, a retired charter boat captain in Cedar Key and registered Republican, said when he first heard Trump’s idea he thought it was ridiculous.
As a map collector and history buff, Underwood said the area has been called the Gulf of Mexico for centuries and believes it should stay that way. “You don’t change history,” he said.
Lifelong Floridian and third-generation crab fisherman James Kelly Kofmehl calls the Gulf of Mexico his home. The registered Republican grew up on the coast in Crystal River and started fishing from his own boat when he was 9 years old.
“It’s still going to be the same body of water that we make our living off,” no matter what it’s called, said Kofmehl, who owns The Crab Plant, a seafood market and restaurant in his hometown stocked with fresh caught stone crabs, mullet, grouper and snapper.
“If you’re a Democrat or you do not like Trump, you are going to hate the idea,” he added. “If you voted for Trump and you like Trump, then you’re going to love the idea.”
Douglas Ricciardi, a registered Republican in Sarasota, 59, runs two Gulf fishing operations and said he believes Trump proposed the name change along with other ideas to distract voters from issues directly affecting them.
“It’s silly,” he said. “That’s just fodder to keep people outraged and not focusing on real things that are going on.”
This story was produced by Fresh Take Florida, a news service of the University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications. The reporters can be reached at aidanbush@ufl.edu and libby.clifton@ufl.edu.
