Date: February 12, 2025
From: Secretary (00)
Subject: Public Display or Depiction of Flags throughout Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Facilities (VIEWS 12780704)
To: Under Secretaries, Assistant Secretaries, and Other Key Officials

  1. To establish more consistent and clear guidance across the Department and among all employees, VA is instituting a new policy, effective immediately, limiting the display of flags, beyond the United States (U.S.) flag, at VA facilities.
  2. VA’s new guidance follows a longstanding Department of Defense policy instituted during the first Trump Administration and kept in place during the Biden Administration.
  3. In addition to the American flag, VA facilities and employees are authorized to display or depict the following representational flags:
    • Flags of U.S. states and territories, or the District of Columbia;
    • Military Service flags;
    • VA flags;
    • Official, branded flag of a U.S. agency;
    • Presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed flags;
    • Prisoner of War/Missing in Action flag;
    • Senior Executive Service (SES) and Military Department-specific SES flags;
    • Ceremonial, command, unit, or branch flags or guidons; and
    • Burial flags to honor a Veteran or Reservist.
  4. This guidance applies to public displays or depictions of flags by VA employees in all VA facilities, workplaces, buildings, common areas, and public areas, including, but not limited to:
    • Individual offices, cubicles, Government vehicles, office buildings, recreational areas, medical centers, storage rooms, kitchens, and restrooms.
    • All spaces or items in public or plain view outside of a VA facility (i.e., parking lot).
  5. The public display or depiction of unauthorized flags in museum exhibits, state-issued license plates, grave sites, memorial markers, monuments, educational displays, historical displays, or works of art, where the nature of the display or depiction cannot reasonably be viewed as endorsement of the flag by the department, is not prohibited.
    Subj: Public Display or Depiction of Flags throughout Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Facilities (VIEWS 12780704)
  6. This guidance rescinds the Secretary’s Flying the Flag During Pride Month Memorandum, dated May 24, 2024, to the extent that the memorandum is still applicable.
  7. This guidance does not impact National Cemetery Administration Directive 3220, dated August 3, 2018, and Notice 2022-03, dated May 6, 2022.
  8. All Veterans and VA beneficiaries will always be welcome at all VA facilities to receive the benefits and services they have earned under the law. This policy will bring consistency and simplicity to the display of flags throughout the Department, whichI expect to have a singular focus: serving the needs of Veterans, their families, caregivers, and survivors.
  9. If you have any questions regarding this guidance, please contact Danielle Runyan, Senior Advisor to the Secretary, at Danielle.Runyan@va.gov.

// ORIGINAL SIGNED //
Douglas A. Collins