Sen. Boxer seeks historic designation for WWII internment camp

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) wants to increase the profile of the largest former Japanese-American internment camp from World War II.

Boxer introduced a bill to designate the Tule Lake camp near California’s northern border as a national historic site, which would bring it in line with other former internment camps and place it under the authority of the National Park Service.

{mosads}Nearly 19,000 people were held at Tule Lake at one point during the years that the federal government forcibly removed Japanese-Americans from their homes and held them in detention for fear they posed a threat during the war.

It was the largest of the 10 camps that held more than 100,000 people of Japanese heritage.

“This legislation will give Tule Lake the national recognition it deserves, while honoring the tens of thousands of Japanese-Americans who were forcibly relocated and incarcerated in one of our country’s darkest moments,” Boxer said in a statement.

Tule Lake is currently part of a national monument designated by President George W. Bush that celebrates American valor in World War II across the Pacific theater.

Most of the sites in that national monument celebrate major wins or losses by the United States, like the attack on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii or a battle on an Alaska island.