After news broke yesterday that President Trump would sign an executive order to re-name the Department of Defense to the Department of War, it’s now official.
Moments ago, President Trump signed the order to restore the original name of the department.
He was joined in the Oval Office by now-Secretary of War Pete Hegseth.
Notably, this marks President Trump’s 200th Executive Order.
Watch the historic moment right here:
🚨 President Donald J. Trump signs an Executive Order officially restoring the name "Department of War" to the Department of Defense.
This is the 200th Executive Order the President has signed since taking office. pic.twitter.com/OuLfuSoRLR
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) September 5, 2025
Prior to signing the order, President Trump delivered some remarks from the Oval Office explaining why he decided to change the name back.
Watch:
🚨BREAKING: President Trump has restored the Department of Defense to its original name: the Department of War.
“We went woke and changed it. We won WW1, WW2, everything before that. We’re going to Department of War. It’s a much more appropriate name.”
pic.twitter.com/8PIvvJrS9e— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) September 5, 2025
The Department of War was known by that name up until 1947, when it was re-named the Department of Defense.
Both President Trump and Pete Hegseth have been wanting to restore the original department name for quite some time.
AP News has more:
The Department of War was created in 1789, then renamed and reorganized through legislation signed by President Harry Truman in 1947, two years after the end of World War II. The Department of Defense incorporated the Department of War, which oversaw the Army, plus the Department of the Navy and the newly created independent Air Force.
ADVERTISEMENT“We decided to go woke and change the name to Department of Defense,” he said. “So we’re going Department of War.”
Pentagon leader Pete Hegseth, who spoke alongside Trump, said, “We haven’t won a major war since” the name was changed. He said, “We’re going to go on offense, not just on defense.”
Trump has said he wants to change the name back to the Department of War because it “just sounded better,” and Hegseth recently hinted that the switch was around the corner.
Speaking to an auditorium of soldiers Thursday at Fort Benning in Georgia, he said he might have “a slightly different title tomorrow.”
In August, Trump told reporters that “everybody likes that we had an unbelievable history of victory when it was Department of War. Then we changed it to Department of Defense.”
When confronted with the possibility that making the name change would require an act of Congress, Trump told reporters that “we’re just going to do it.”
“I’m sure Congress will go along,” he said, “if we need that.”
What do you think?
Do you like the name change:
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