Trumbull officials commemorate legacy of McKinley amid controversy
NILES
It was 114 years ago today that Niles native William McKinley, the nation’s 25th president, died of gunshot wounds from an assassin’s bullets in Buffalo, N.Y. In a ceremony Sunday at the National McKinley Memorial, Trumbull County Republicans and Democrats put aside partisanship to honor the late president’s legacy.
County Commissioner Dan Polivka, Trumbull Democratic chairman, said the quickly put together commemoration was spurred by the recent decision to change the name of Alaska’s Mount McKinley to Mount Denali, as it was originally referred to by native tribes before it bore McKinley’s name.
Alaskan political leaders have praised the change while Ohio’s congressional representatives have condemned it.
“We’re hoping that if [the name change] isn’t reversed, then there will be a compromise,” said Polivka and his counterpart, county Republican chairman Randy Law. “We’d like to see it kept the way it was,” Law said.