San Francisco public schools to consider renaming Dianne Feinstein elementary

The San Francisco Unified School District is considering renaming one-third of its public schools, including an elementary school honoring long-time Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

Last week, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that school officials had deemed the names of 44 of its city's public schools "inappropriate." Schools were added to the list if named after a person who owned slaves, was a colonizer, oppressed women or the LGBT community, perpetrated human-rights abuses, or was known to be a racist or white supremacist. 

According to a 1984 copy Communist newspaper the Workers Vanguard, Feinstein, as mayor of San Francisco, raised a Confederate flag at the city's Civic Center, and later replaced it when it was torn down by protesters, putting the Feinstein school on the list.  

The report was released in the same week Feinstein, as the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, was criticized for being too soft in the confirmation hearings for Trump Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett.

Following the the outbreak of national racial-justice protests this summer, city and state governments across the country are considering renaming buildings and institutions named for figures with imperfect personal histories.

Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser created a task force to review the names of local schools and landmarks that may potentially be renamed – among them, the Jefferson Memorial and Washington Monument.