WASHINGTON — A group of House Republicans has introduced legislation to rename Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia after former President Donald Trump.
The bill, filed Friday, is sponsored by Rep. Guy Reschenthaler, R-Pa., the chief deputy majority whip, and is co-sponsored by six other Republicans: Reps. Michael Waltz, of Florida; Andrew Ogles, of Tennessee; Chuck Fleischmann, of Tennessee; Paul Gosar, of Arizona; Barry Moore, of Alabama; and Troy Nehls, of Texas.
The measure says it would “designate the Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia as the ‘Donald J. Trump International Airport.'”
It was referred to the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee for further consideration.
“Freedom. Prosperity. Strength. That’s what America stood for under the leadership of President Donald J. Trump — the best president of my lifetime,” Reschenthaler wrote Tuesday in a post on X. “And that’s why I’m introducing legislation to rename Dulles as the Donald J. Trump International Airport.”
Some House Democrats expressed disbelief over the move to rename the airport, 26 miles west of downtown Washington, D.C.
“This idea is ridiculous, but sadly real,” Rep. Abigail Spanberger, who’s running for governor of Virginia, wrote Tuesday in a post on X, adding that Congress instead should focus on reauthorizing the Federal Aviation Administration and passing foreign aid. “Yet this is what a Member of House Republican leadership focuses on — renaming Virginia’s Dulles airport after Trump.”
Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., wrote in a thread on X Tuesday that one of Trump’s first acts as president was “a racist Muslim ban that blocked permanent American residents from their own country.” The congressman said he went to the Dulles airport at the time “to try to help innocent people caught up in the chaos.”
“I remember Republicans like those who wrote this bill hiding and giving mealy mouthed responses when asked about the suffering Trump’s Muslim ban caused,” Beyer wrote. “They know Dulles will never be renamed after Trump. Again, that’s not the point, the point is to suck up to their Dear Leader.”
Former Rep. Denver Riggleman, R-Va., who assisted the House select committee that investigated Jan. 6 in the last Congress, said on X Tuesday that the filing of the bill was no April Fools’ joke. “No sane VA rep would support it. If you want to ‘sycophant’ stick to your own damn airports,” he said.
Dulles opened in December 1962 and was named after John Foster Dulles, who served as secretary of state under President Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953 to 1959.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
