#national-park-service

For Over a Year, Trump Officials Have Quietly Directed the Park Service to Carve a Strip Out of Yosemite National Park and Hand It to a Private Real-Estate Firm — Giving the Developer's Adjacent 83 Acres the "Exceptionally Rare" Private Road Access That Would Make Its Value "Explode" — and the Firm's CEO Began Making Monthly Donations to Trump and the GOP the Same Year He Bought the Land

According to reporting broken by NOTUS and confirmed by the Washington Post and others, the National Park Service has spent more than a year quietly working to fulfill what one account calls an "unprecedented" directive from Trump officials: to parcel off a roughly quarter-mile strip inside Yosemite National Park and transfer it to a private developer. The beneficiary is Kingsbarn Realty Capital, a real-estate private-equity firm that in 2024 bought 83 acres just outside the park — for about $4 million, through a limited-liability company called "Sanctuary at Yosemite." Kingsbarn's CEO, Jeff Pori, wants to build a short road connecting that private land to one of Yosemite's central roads, which would hand his property "exceptionally rare" private access to a national park and, in the words of one person familiar with the talks, make its value "explode." Here is the "guess who benefits" part: Pori, who had no history of donating to national political campaigns before October 2024, began making monthly donations to the Republican Party, Trump's campaign committee, and associated PACs between 2024 and 2025 — the same window in which he acquired the land and the administration began pursuing the deal. Nothing about the transfer is finalized, and the timeline stops short of a proven quid pro quo. But the shape is unmistakable: a new Trump donor stands to receive a piece of one of America's crown-jewel national parks, at an enormous private windfall, through an unprecedented use of federal power to benefit a single company.

Trump Used America's 250th Birthday to Campaign for His Face on Mount Rushmore — He Posted a Gold Video of Himself Carved into the Monument, the White House Said He'd Be "No Better Addition," He Distributed Cookies on Air Force One Depicting Himself as the Fifth President on the Mountain, and He Flew the Qatari Jet Over the Sacred Lakota Site While Hailstorms Battered the Crowd Below

On the eve of the 250th anniversary of American independence, Trump flew to Mount Rushmore on the Qatari-gifted Air Force One, buzzed the monument twice for the cameras, delivered a 28-minute speech warning of a "communist menace," and distributed cookies aboard the jet depicting his face carved into Mount Rushmore as the fifth president. Conservative commentator Benny Johnson posted photos of the cookies — which showed five presidential faces instead of four — calling them "the cookies Trump gave out last night on Air Force One." Earlier that day, Trump had posted a video on Truth Social showing a gold-plated 3D rendering of Mount Rushmore with his face mounted next to Lincoln's, with a voiceover: "I will be the greatest president for many, many years to come." White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers said publicly: "There would be no better addition to the iconic Mount Rushmore than the 45th and 47th President of the United States, Donald Trump." Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) introduced H.R. 792 in January 2025 directing the Interior Secretary to carve Trump's likeness into the monument. Roger Stone pushed a "One More for Rushmore" petition. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said there is "certainly" room. None of this is possible: the National Park Service says Mount Rushmore is a completed work of art with no viable locations for additional carvings. The original sculptor wrote in 1936 that adding a fifth head was impossible due to stone limitations. An engineer who oversaw rock monitoring at the site: "It comes down to the geology, the engineering. It just can't be done." The mountain is sacred to the Lakota Sioux — known to them as the Six Grandfathers — on land the Supreme Court ruled in 1980 was illegally seized. The Oglala Sioux Tribal Council passed a resolution opposing the event. The 4,800 lottery-selected attendees endured two hailstorms and shelter-in-place alerts before Trump spoke. The fireworks — first at the site in six years, revived by Trump over environmental concerns about drought, wildfires, and endangered bat species — cost $700,000. In 2020, then-Governor Kristi Noem gifted Trump a four-foot replica of Mount Rushmore with his face. He was "totally serious" when he told her it was his dream to be up there.