A West Point alumni group has abruptly canceled its upcoming award ceremony for Oscar-winning actor and prominent President Joe Biden supporter Tom Hanks.
The prestigious U.S. Military Academy, located north of New York City, had planned to honor the 69-year-old Forrest Gump star with the Sylvanus Thayer Award at a ceremony on September 25. The award is traditionally presented to an “outstanding citizen” who is not an alumnus of the academy but exemplifies its ideals of “duty, honor, and country.” Former president Barack Obama received the honor last year.
Retired Army Col. Mark Bieger, president and chief executive officer of the West Point Association of Graduates, announced in an email Friday that the ceremony and parade would no longer go forward.
“This decision allows the Academy to continue its focus on its core mission of preparing cadets to lead, fight, and win as officers in the world’s most lethal force, the United States Army,” Bieger wrote, according to the Washington Post.
It was not made clear whether Hanks’ honor had been revoked or if he would be celebrated in a different way.
The Independent has contacted West Point and Hanks’ representative for comment.
Hanks, a longtime Democrat, was originally named the 2025 recipient of the institution’s Thayer Award in June. “Tom Hanks has done more for the positive portrayal of the American service member, more for the caring of the American veteran, their caregivers and their family, and more for the American space program and all branches of government than many other Americans,” said Robert McDonald, a former secretary of veterans affairs and the alumni association’s board chairman.
The prolific Hollywood star has portrayed U.S. service members in several movies, including Saving Private Ryan (1998), Forrest Gump (1994), and Greyhound (2020).
At the time, the Sleepless in Seattle actor and frequent Donald Trump critic called the honor “humbling and meaningful.”
The ceremony’s unexpected cancellation comes as the college faces mounting political pressure from the Trump administration, which has barred military academies from “promoting, advancing or otherwise inculcating” ideas deemed “un-American,” including “gender ideology” and the idea that “America’s founding documents are racist or sexist.”
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Late last month, West Point dissolved its sociology major and canceled history classes on gender and race and ethnicity. Professors were forced to remove works from James Baldwin, Toni Morrison, and other writers of color.
Just last week, the institution’s library rehung a portrait of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. The picture had been removed in 2022 to comply with a Department of Defense directive that ordered the academy to address racial injustice and do away with installations that “commemorate or memorialize the Confederacy.”
After the painting was restored, Rebecca Hodson, the Army’s communications director, said in a prepared statement: “At West Point, the United States Military Academy is prepared to restore historical names, artifacts, and assets to their original form and place. Under this administration, we honor our history and learn from it — we don’t erase it.”
