The Power to Name

In early 2025, President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 14172, launching a campaign titled “Restoring Names That Honor American Greatness.” The executive order sparked immediate controversy by renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the "Gulf of America" and restoring Alaska’s Denali to its former federal designation as "Mount McKinley." These choices, seemingly symbolic, ripple through the national and international landscape with far-reaching consequences. They serve not only as acts of renaming but as declarations—of pride, power, and the precarious boundaries of national identity. The Gulf of America, in particular, becomes more than a renamed body of water; it’s a bold rebranding of geography itself, where the lines between cartography and ideology blur into an effort to anchor a singular vision of American exceptionalism.

The change to the Gulf's name reverberates far beyond the map. It redefines a region long shared by multiple countries and ecosystems. With approximately 95% of the Gulf’s coastline belonging to both Mexico and the United States, the naming carries weight beyond American borders. Yet the decision was made unilaterally, without consultation or cooperation with neighboring governments. For many Americans, this move stirred pride. A Gallup poll showed 60% support for the new name, with respondents describing a feeling of restored national dignity. Others, however, viewed the change as modern imperialism—a rhetorical land grab cloaked in patriotism.

The Mexican government’s response was swift and scathing. President Claudia Sheinbaum’s remarks about renaming North America to "Mexican America" may have been tongue-in-cheek, but they underscored real concerns. When a powerful nation unilaterally rebrands shared geographic features, it destabilizes diplomatic trust. Such decisions fracture the collaborative relationships necessary for environmental protections, disaster response, and economic trade within the region. Shared waterways like the Gulf have historically been areas of scientific study, mutual dependence, and international treaties. The sudden renaming—absent diplomacy—risks unraveling years of cooperation.

Beyond its literal implications, renaming the Gulf is a statement about whose stories are visible and whose are erased. It disregards the legacies of Spanish exploration, indigenous presence, and cultural exchange across centuries. Bodies of water have names that reflect layers of conquest, trade, and colonization—but changing those names without reckoning with their complexity merely overlays one story atop another, often the dominant over the suppressed. The newly dubbed Gulf of America doesn't just redraw the map; it attempts to redraw history.

That tension only deepens with the reversion of Denali back to Mount McKinley. The mountain, long known by its indigenous name, was renamed after President William McKinley in 1896, though he had no connection to Alaska. In 2015, President Barack Obama restored the name Denali in recognition of the Koyukon Athabascan people and their centuries-old connection to the mountain. Trump's decision to reverse this—symbolically undoing Obama’s gesture—sparked outrage among indigenous communities. A survey of Alaska Natives found that 70% preferred the name Denali, seeing it as a rightful restoration of cultural memory. The federal switch back to McKinley appears, to many, as not just an erasure but an insult.

Supporters of the Mount McKinley renaming framed it as a celebration of American history and progress, honoring a president who led the nation during an era of expansion. Yet, even McKinley himself had never set foot in Alaska. His name’s placement on the peak was always political—a way to assert American ownership over newly acquired territory. The choice to reassert that name in 2025 is likewise political, intended to reframe national identity around the legacies of presidents past, regardless of their relevance to local cultures.

The public remains deeply divided. The executive order has lit a match under conversations about identity, patriotism, and historical legitimacy. Grassroots protests emerged both in Alaska and along the Gulf coast, challenging the notion that greatness can be imposed from above. Many feel that by reviving names tied to conquest or nationalism, the administration failed to listen to those with generational ties to the land and water. For critics, these names are more than words on a map—they are stories, relationships, and the record of who was allowed to define the world.

Unilateral renaming, particularly when it involves places with shared histories or shared borders, often meets resistance because it denies participation. It says: we alone decide what matters. In a nation built on a patchwork of stories, that claim rings hollow to many. Naming, after all, is power—the power to frame perception, to anchor memory, and to declare ownership. When that power is exercised without consent, it may unify some, but it alienates others just as deeply.

The international consequences cannot be overstated. The Gulf of Mexico—now the Gulf of America—supports fishing industries, tourism, oil production, and environmental conservation initiatives that depend on binational collaboration. When the U.S. unilaterally renames the Gulf, it signals a shift away from cooperation. Diplomatic channels have already reported increased tension over shared maritime rights and joint scientific research agreements. Some Mexican officials suggest the name change may be used as justification for policy shifts around resource access. Even tourism suffers; educational programs and historical tours built around existing names must now revise materials, leading to confusion and eroded trust with foreign visitors. Nearly a third of international tourists to the Gulf cite its historical significance—something lessened by a perceived act of cultural overwriting.

Cultural erasure is not new to the United States. Indigenous names, languages, and histories have long been rewritten or ignored. Yet in recent years, a movement has emerged to reclaim original names as part of a broader reckoning with colonization and forced assimilation. The reversion of Denali to Mount McKinley appears to many as a rebuke of that progress. It signals a preference for myths of American expansion over the realities of indigenous endurance. Names like Denali carry more than letters—they carry meaning passed through generations. To strip that away feels, to many, like a fresh wound on an old scar.

The deeper question this moment raises is: who gets to write the story of America? Is it a top-down narrative, curated by executive orders and declarations of greatness? Or is it a collective narrative, shaped through dialogue, acknowledgment, and the hard work of repair? The battle over names is, at its core, a battle over truth and memory. The idea that greatness must be restored through symbolic renaming reveals a fear that America’s greatness is in question. But true greatness might lie in the courage to share the pen.

For future leaders, this episode offers a cautionary tale. Nationalism without collaboration invites division. Pride without recognition of others breeds resentment. Names can be both unifying and divisive, depending on who chooses them and why. Leaders must weigh the symbolic value of names against their tangible consequences. They must ask whose history is being honored and whose is being obscured.

The consequences of Executive Order 14172 will not disappear with the news cycle. Maps will change, debates will continue, and cultural tensions will remain unresolved. As climate change intensifies and borderlands face new challenges, international cooperation will become more—not less—important. The names we use to describe shared places matter, not only because they shape how we see the world, but because they shape how we live in it together.

The renaming of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America and the reassertion of Mount McKinley as a national symbol are not just geographic adjustments. They are ideological markers in a contested landscape of identity, memory, and meaning. Their immediate impact may be symbolic, but their long-term consequences will ripple outward—into classrooms, boardrooms, diplomatic meetings, and daily life. How we name the world is how we claim our place in it. And when the naming is done without consensus, the world becomes smaller, not greater.

The Gulf of America now stands as a monument to unilateralism, a vast body of water renamed by a pen stroke rather than by shared vision. Whether it will remain so depends not only on political power but on the public's willingness to question who speaks for them—and who, too often, is spoken over.