The Remove the Stain Act would rescind all 20 Medals of Honor awarded to U.S. 7th Cavalry soldiers following the Wounded Knee Massacre on December 29, 1890, in which approximately 350–375 unarmed Native American men, women, and children were killed by heavily armed soldiers. The bill, introduced by Senator Warren and seven other senators, finds that the massacre was a brutal attack where nearly two-thirds of the victims were unarmed women and children, and that most American casualties resulted from friendly fire rather than combat, making the awards inconsistent with the Medal of Honor's standard of "outstanding gallantry beyond the call of duty." The names of the 20 recipients would be removed from official Medal of Honor records, though the bill specifies that no one would be required to physically return their medal and recipients would retain all federal benefits. The legislation responds to long-standing requests from tribal nations, including the 2001 Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe resolution and the 2007 National Congress of American Indians resolution, to revoke these medals as a matter of historical justice and the integrity of the nation's highest military decoration.
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