Trump floats renaming Atlantic and Pacific oceans after Lake Ontario becomes ‘Lake America’

WASHINGTON, DC: President Donald Trump on Thursday, August 27, suggested that the Atlantic and Pacific oceans could potentially be renamed next, after signing an executive order changing the name of Lake Ontario to “Lake America.” 

Trump made the remarks while announcing the order, which directs the federal government to update the lake’s name in its official records and maps.

Trump says Atlantic, Pacific could be next

Trump raised the possibility of changing the names of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans next, while explaining his decision to rename Lake Ontario. “As you know, we took something called the Gulf of Mexico, we changed it, and now it's very routinely the Gulf of America,” Trump said.

“So if you think about it, we have a gulf and we have a lake. Now all we need is an ocean,” he continued. “So maybe we'll have to change the name of the Atlantic and or the Pacific. Maybe we'll change them both.”

Trump said the Lake Ontario name change was “official, effective immediately” after he signed the order. “And finally, it's the purpose of this more than anything else is we're going to be changing the name of Lake Ontario, effective immediately to Lake America,” Trump said. “That's going to take place right now as I signed the order."

The order directs Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, working with the Board on Geographic Names, to update the lake’s name in the federal Geographic Names Information System within 30 days. Federal maps, contracts, documents and agency communications are also to use “Lake America” and remove references to “Lake Ontario.”

The change applies to US federal usage. The order does not determine what Canada calls the lake, which borders both Canada and New York. Trump’s order argues that the United States has played a major role in protecting the Great Lakes, citing nearly $4 billion in US freshwater ecosystem investments over the past decade.

“In recognition of this flourishing economic resource and its critical importance to our Nation’s economy and its people, I am directing that the Lake officially be renamed as Lake America,” Trump wrote.

Renaming push follows Gulf of America change

The “Lake America” order is not the first time the administration has changed the name of international water bodies. In January last year, Trump signed an executive order directing the federal government to use “Gulf of America” instead of “Gulf of Mexico.” Trump then later proclaimed February 9, 2025, as the first “Gulf of America Day.”

However, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney pushed back against the Lake Ontario renaming, emphasizing the lake’s historical name and its Indigenous origins. “The name of Lake Ontario derives from the Wendat word ‘Ontari’io’, which means ‘the lake is beautiful, the lake is great,’” Carney wrote in a post on X.

“This name dates back more than 400 years, well before the Canadian Confederation and the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America.” The Canadian leader concluded by firmly stating that “this lake is called Lake Ontario, today and forever.”