The Navy confirms it received a request to move the USS John McCain out of Trump's sight in Japan

USS John McCain.
(Image credit: Grady T. Fontana/U.S. Navy via Getty Images)

The U.S. Navy on Friday confirmed reports that White House officials requested the USS John McCain be obscured from view during President Trump's visit to Japan last week, CNN reports. The Wall Street Journal first reported the request on Wednesday, but the Navy did not address the situation immediately.

"A request was made to the U.S. Navy to minimize the visibility of USS John S. McCain, however, all ships remained in their normal configuration during the President's visit," Rear Admiral Charlie Brown, chief of Navy information, said in a statement. "There were also no intentional efforts to explicitly exclude Sailors assigned to USS John S. McCain."

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Tim O'Donnell

Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.