The Gulf of Mexico, the body of water that has been known by that name for more than 400 years, is now called the “Gulf of America” on both Apple Maps and Google Maps after Donald Trump decreed the name change.
Apple made the change to the Gulf of America on Tuesday for users of its maps app in the United States and said it would soon roll out the new name for all users globally, per Bloomberg.
According to Google, it made the change after the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) in the U.S. officially updated “Gulf of Mexico” to “Gulf of America.” The internet giant said people using Google Maps in the U.S. will see Gulf of America, people in Mexico will see Gulf of Mexico and everyone else will see both names.
Trump, on his first day in office for a second term as U.S. president, signed an executive order directing the Secretary of the Interior to adopt the name “Gulf of America” to replace the long-held name of the body of water “extending to the seaward boundary with Mexico and Cuba.”
Following Trump’s order, the Associated Press said it would continue to refer to it as the Gulf of Mexico.
On Tuesday, AP executive editor Julie Pace said the news organization was informed by the White House that if AP “did not align its editorial standards with President Donald Trump’s executive order renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America, AP would be barred from accessing an event in the Oval Office.” On Tuesday afternoon, an AP reporter was blocked from attending an executive order signing at the White House, according to Pace.
“It is alarming that the Trump administration would punish AP for its independent journalism,” Pace said in a statement. “Limiting our access to the Oval Office based on the content of AP’s speech not only severely impedes the public’s access to independent news, it plainly violates the First Amendment.”
The AP, in a style guide decision announced last month, said it would continue to call it the Gulf of Mexico “while acknowledging the new name Trump has chosen. As a global news agency that disseminates news around the world, the AP must ensure that place names and geography are easily recognizable to all audiences.”
