Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced Tuesday that a Civil War monument removed under the Biden administration from Arlington National Cemetery will be restored to its original location.
The monument, known as the Reconciliation Monument or the Confederate Memorial, was removed by the Pentagon in December 2023 under President Joe Biden because of its links to the Confederacy. First erected in 1914, the monument sat in a section of the cemetery where around 400 Confederate soldiers were buried.
“I’m proud to announce that Moses Ezekiel’s beautiful and historic sculpture — often referred to as ‘The Reconciliation Monument’ — will be rightfully be returned to Arlington National Cemetery near his burial site,” Hegseth announced on X. “It never should have been taken down by woke lemmings. Unlike the Left, we don’t believe in erasing American history—we honor it.”
I’m proud to announce that Moses Ezekiel’s beautiful and historic sculpture — often referred to as “The Reconciliation Monument” — will be rightfully be returned to Arlington National Cemetery near his burial site.
It never should have been taken down by woke lemmings. Unlike…
— Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth (@SecDef) August 5, 2025
The news was first reported by The Blaze.
In 1906, Secretary of War and future president William Howard Taft approved plans to construct a memorial near the Confederate graves. The monument was created by prominent Jewish American sculptor Moses Ezekiel, who fought for Virginia during the Civil War.
Featured on the monument are 14 shields referencing the 11 official Confederate states, and the border states of Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri. There are also figures of southern soldiers and civilians alongside mythical gods.
The monument references Isaiah 2:4, a passage in the Bible that talks about turning swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, a powerful message for a nation recovering from the trauma of war and the deaths of 600,000 Americans. Many presidents, including Barack Obama, have sent flowers to the monument on Memorial Day.
After the removal by the Biden administration, the monument was moved to a Defense Department storage facility in Virginia.
“At the request of Moses Ezekiel’s family and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Moses Ezekiel’s sculpture will be returned to Arlington National Cemetery,” Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin told the Blaze’s Beltway Brief, “where he is buried and where his legacy as a renowned American artist and decorated veteran can be honored.”
Youngkin added that the monument would be refurbished and would be back on display in Arlington by 2027.
The announcement from Hegseth came after the National Park Service said Monday that it would be returning the statue of former Confederate General Albert Pike to Washington, D.C. The statue was torn down during a riot in June 2020 and never went back on display.
