(AFP) – US President Donald Trump cheered Monday after a West Point military academy ceremony honoring “Saving Private Ryan” star and outspoken critic Tom Hanks was canceled. The multiple Oscar-winning actor — who was also an executive producer for several acclaimed miniseries about World War II — was meant to be hosted by the academy’s alumni association later this month. However, news emerged over the weekend that this had been abruptly scrapped.
Trump, who has overseen a purge of perceived opponents across civil society and the government — including inside the US military — said he was pleased. “Our great West Point (getting greater all the time!) has smartly cancelled the Award Ceremony for actor Tom Hanks. Important move!” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform. “We don’t need destructive, WOKE recipients getting our cherished American Awards!!!” the president wrote, in an apparent reference to Hanks’ Democratic political leanings.
Hanks was due to receive the prestigious Sylvanus Thayer Award from the West Point Association of Graduates (WPAOG) on September 25. According to The Washington Post, an email from the alumni association announcing the change did not specify whether Hanks would still receive the award without the ceremony.
The Thayer award is given to “an outstanding citizen of the United States whose service and accomplishments in the national interest exemplify personal devotion to the ideals expressed in West Point’s motto: ‘Duty, Honor, Country,'” the WPAOG said when announcing Hanks as the 2025 recipient. “Much of Hanks’ five-decade career reflects his support of veterans, the military, and America’s space program,” it said in a statement.
Hanks starred as an Army captain who landed at D-Day in “Saving Private Ryan,” and portrayed a destroyer commander crossing the Atlantic as U-boats hunted for American ships in “Greyhound.” He also executive produced three miniseries about World War II: “Band of Brothers” about paratroopers in Europe, “The Pacific” about Marines fighting against Japanese forces, and “Masters of the Air” about the crews of US bombers.
Hanks — who also served as a national spokesperson for the World War II memorial campaign and was chair of the D-Day museum capital campaign — had expressed excitement about visiting West Point. “To have my first ever visit to the Academy be to accept such an honor as the Thayer Award is simply astounding,” the WPAOG statement quoted him as saying.
The alumni association did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the cancelation of the ceremony, which comes after Trump’s administration took aim at both library books and personnel at West Point earlier in the year. In May, the Pentagon ordered a hunt for and sequestration of materials in US military academy and war college libraries that contain information on subjects including diversity, anti-racism and transgender people. Two months later, the secretary of the army directed West Point to rescind an offer for a former cybersecurity agency chief to hold a prestigious position at the military academy after she drew the ire of a far-right conspiracy theorist.
– W.G. DUNLOP
© 2024 AFP
