America’s Best Idea: National Parks, National Identity, and the Political Struggle for Preservation

Few symbols of the American spirit loom as large as the national parks. President Franklin D. Roosevelt once observed that “there is nothing so American as our national parks… the fundamental idea behind the parks…is that the country belongs to the people”. These vast landscapes and historic sites – “America’s best idea,” in the words of novelist Wallace Stegner – reflect a national ideal: that certain places should be preserved for all people and for future generations, not merely exploited for short-term gain. From the beginning, the national parks have been more than tourist attractions; they are arenas where competing visions of national identity play out. The struggle to balance conservation and development, public access and private profit, science and politics has defined the parks’ history. As stewards of natural wonders and the nation’s historic memory, the parks are entwined with American identity – and thus often at the center of political battles over what that identity means.

Today, that struggle has reached a new intensity. In January 2025, Donald Trump returned to the White House, bringing with him a renewed push to roll back environmental protections and reshape public land policies. In just a few months, the second Trump administration has unleashed a barrage of executive actions, regulatory reversals, and budgetary moves that critics say threaten the very mission of the National Park Service (NPS) and the integrity of “America’s best idea.” This essay traces the historical and political significance of America’s national parks – from their origins under visionaries like Theodore Roosevelt, through pivotal policy eras under presidents such as Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and others – and examines how each era’s politics left its mark on the parks. It then focuses on the renewed threats and policy rollbacks in 2025, analyzing how recent decisions under Trump’s second presidency imperil not only individual parks but the core values of conservation and democratic stewardship. Specific cases, from the attempted dismantling of new national monuments to dramatic cuts to the Park Service’s workforce, illustrate broader trends. Finally, we consider a path forward: real, forward-looking and bipartisan solutions to safeguard the parks’ natural and historical legacy, in line with the values of environmental protection, historical preservation, and democratic accountability.

Where Preservation Took Root: Yellowstone and the Birth of the National Park Ideal

The national park idea was born in the 19th century, when Americans began to recognize that some natural treasures should be saved from private exploitation. In 1872, Congress established Yellowstone as the world’s first true national park, setting aside over two million acres “for the benefit and enjoyment of the people.” This radical notion – that scenic wonders like geysers, canyons, and peaks should be kept in public trust – reflected a young nation’s democratic ethos and pride in its unique landscapes. Over the following decades, additional parks such as Yosemite, Sequoia, and Mount Rainier were created. Yet in these early years, there was little overarching policy or agency to manage them, and protection was often haphazard. The turning point came with the rise of the Progressive conservation movement in the early 1900s, embodied by President Theodore Roosevelt. A lifelong outdoorsman alarmed by the destruction of wildlife and forests, Roosevelt used the powers of his office to an unprecedented degree to preserve public lands. Between 1901 and 1909, he established 150 national forests, 51 federal bird reserves, 4 game preserves, 5 national parks, and 18 national monuments, protecting approximately 230 million acres of land – an area roughly the size of the entire Eastern Seaboard. It was Roosevelt who signed the Antiquities Act of 1906, which for the first time empowered presidents to designate national monuments on federal land to protect “historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest.” He wasted no time wielding this authority – famously declaring the Grand Canyon untouchable (“Leave it as it is. You cannot improve on it.”) by proclaiming it a national monument when Congress initially balked at making it a park. Roosevelt’s crusade for conservation, alongside like-minded figures such as naturalist John Muir, firmly established the principle that preserving nature and history was a core public good. In 1916, this principle was cemented in law with the creation of the National Park Service under President Woodrow Wilson, which mandated that the parks be managed “to conserve the scenery, natural and historic objects, and wildlife… unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.” From the outset, then, the parks were intertwined with national identity: as Stephen Mather, the first NPS director, said in 1917, the parks are national properties in which every citizen has a vested interest, “the highest potentialities of national pride, national contentment, and national health”. They were to be both sanctuaries of American heritage and a democratic commons open to all.

Yet even in these early days, the parks faced political struggles over their purpose and resources. One telling episode was the fight over Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park. In 1913, despite vehement opposition from preservationists like Muir, Congress approved damming the valley to provide water for San Francisco – essentially overriding park protection for a utilitarian purpose. The loss of Hetch Hetchy was a bitter lesson that economic and political pressures could trump conservation, and it galvanized the young conservation movement. The episode underscored that the story of the parks would never be a simple, unbroken triumph of preservation; rather, it would be a push-and-pull between preservation and development – a reflection of broader American debates about land, resources, and who gets to decide their use. In the following decades, the park system continued to grow (Grand Canyon finally became a National Park in 1919), and the NPS evolved a dual mission to protect resources while also promoting public enjoyment. This balance was often challenging. During the New Deal of the 1930s, for example, President Franklin D. Roosevelt expanded the park system (including significant new parks and historic sites) and poured resources into them via programs like the Civilian Conservation Corps, which built trails, roads, and facilities. FDR, echoing his cousin Theodore, argued that the parks were essential to American democracy – places where citizens from all walks could mingle in common appreciation of natural beauty. His famous line that the parks are an American idea and “belong to the people” became a touchstone. At the same time, development within parks (roads, lodges, even dams) accelerated to accommodate visitors, raising perennial questions: How do we welcome the public without loving the parks to death? And how do we fund and staff these vast preserves adequately? These questions persist to this day, entwined with politics and budgets.

Conservation Becomes National Policy: The 1960s and 1970s

By the 1960s, a broad environmental awakening was underway in America, and the national parks were both beneficiaries of and contributors to this movement. Visitation was booming as post-war prosperity and mobility brought millions to parks each year. But increased awareness of pollution, species extinctions, and ecological fragility led to calls for stronger protections – not just inside parks but across the environment. A bipartisan consensus emerged that government must actively guard the nation’s air, water, wildlife, and natural areas. The result was the era’s landmark environmental laws, many spearheaded or signed by an unlikely champion: President Richard Nixon. Though Nixon was not known as an outdoorsman and privately derided environmentalists, his administration – responding to public pressure – enacted an unparalleled suite of protective measures that still form the backbone of U.S. environmental policy. In a brief span around 1970, Nixon signed the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which requires environmental impact reviews and public input for major federal actions; created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA); approved the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act to curb pollution; and endorsed the Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973, safeguarding species at risk. “1970 will be known as the year of the beginning, in which we really began to move on the problems of clean air and clean water and open spaces for future generations,” Nixon proclaimed as he signed the Clean Air Act. This flurry of legislation dramatically strengthened the legal safety net for national parks. Air and water pollution that originated outside park boundaries could now be regulated; development projects would face scrutiny for their environmental impacts (for instance, highway or dam projects that might affect parks); and species like the bald eagle or grizzly bear found refuge under federal protection. It was a time of ambitious goals and optimism – and notably, much of it had bipartisan support. The idea that protecting natural heritage was part of the national interest transcended party lines in this period.

In parallel, the park system itself grew, including new types of units. In 1964, the Wilderness Act protected large tracts of federal land (some within national parks) as wilderness, limiting development to preserve their pristine condition. In 1970, for example, much of Yosemite was designated wilderness, reinforcing the conservation mandate. President Lyndon B. Johnson and later President Jimmy Carter also left marks: Johnson oversaw the creation of national parks like North Cascades and Redwoods (established in 1968 to save California’s towering redwood groves), and Carter, in 1980, signed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA), which added over 40 million acres to the park and refuge systems in Alaska – the largest expansion of protected lands in U.S. history. These moves were not without controversy (ANILCA, for instance, met opposition from those who feared locking up land from resource development), but they flowed from a prevailing view that conservation was a patriotic duty and a forward-looking investment. By the late 1970s, Americans could rightly claim world leadership in the national park idea: the U.S. had created dozens of new park units (historic sites, recreation areas, seashores, etc., in addition to traditional parks) and exported the concept abroad, as many countries established their own national parks inspired by Yellowstone’s example.

Yet, even at this zenith of environmental policy, the seeds of political backlash were sprouting. As federal land protections increased, so did resentment among some industries and Western state politicians who chafed at restrictions on mining, logging, and grazing. In the late 1970s the so-called Sagebrush Rebellion took hold – a movement of Western states’ leaders seeking to roll back federal control and even transfer public lands to state or private hands. They argued that Washington was overreaching and stifling economic opportunity in the West. Though the Sagebrush Rebellion didn’t achieve its aims, it foreshadowed the battles to come. The national parks and public lands, once a relatively uncontroversial source of pride, were becoming politicized in new ways – seen by some as symbols of federal overreach or elitism, and by others as sacred commons to be defended against commercial exploitation. This polarization set the stage for the confrontations of the 1980s.

The 1980s Backlash: “Trees or Jobs” – Reagan’s Approach

The election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 marked a sharp turning point in the political climate for national parks and the environment. Reagan arrived in Washington on a wave of conservative promises to shrink government and unleash America’s resource industries. His administration openly questioned the regulatory regime built in the previous decade. To lead the Department of the Interior (which oversees the Park Service and other land agencies), Reagan appointed James G. Watt, a pro-development hard-liner who embodied the Sagebrush Rebellion ethos. Watt infamously declared, “I will err on the side of public use versus preservation”, signaling that recreation and exploitation would take precedence over conservation. Indeed, Watt made it clear that expansion of the national park system had come to an abrupt end under his watch. He viewed the parks not primarily as sanctuaries for wilderness and wildlife, but as underutilized assets needing more private investment and access. Maintenance of roads, visitor facilities, and concessions took priority over ecological management. Protecting wilderness “for its own sake,” Watt believed, was a misguided obsession of environmentalists – one he did not share.

Some of the ideas floated by Reagan’s team were unprecedented and alarming to conservationists. Early on, there was talk of turning over park operations to private companies, closing ‘unprofitable’ parks, and expanding drilling and mining on parklands. There were even suggestions to de-authorize certain national parks (effectively removing their protected status) if they were deemed to have too few visitors or too many resources of commercial interest. These extreme proposals provoked a national outcry. The “forecasts of doom” in 1981 – that Reagan would dismantle the park system – were only partially checked by resistance from Congress and the public. In practice, many of the most radical ideas never became formal policy due to intense opposition. The Administration even surprised critics by appointing a respected conservationist, William Penn Mott, to head the Park Service at one point. Routine park maintenance continued, budgets were modestly sufficient for basic needs, and no parks were outright closed in the Reagan years. On the surface, the national parks survived the Reagan era intact.

However, behind the scenes, much damage was done to the spirit of conservation. Reagan’s Interior Department “dragged its feet” on buying private inholdings inside parks and refused to consider new parks or expansions, even where there was strong ecological justification. The administration’s policy “emphasized use at the expense of conservation,” often overruling or sidelining Park Service professionals who advocated for protection. Destry Jarvis, a leader of a park watchdog group at the time, observed that while Reagan’s team funded visitor facilities on par with past administrations, “there’s no question in my mind that this administration is the worst in history regarding parks when it comes to the issue of resource protection and conservation”. The bias toward development was evident: entrance fees were sharply raised (Grand Teton’s fee jumped from $2 to $10), donation “poor boxes” appeared in visitor centers to compensate for budget shortfalls, and moves to benefit private industries – such as allowing expanded mining and drilling near parks – were pursued where possible. Watt himself became a lightning rod. He was unapologetically hostile to environmentalists (once quipping that they are “a left-wing cult dedicated to bringing down the kind of government I believe in”) and was eventually forced to resign in 1983 after a string of controversies. But his tenure proved a sobering lesson: as one historian noted, preservationists “relearned bitter lessons from national park history, namely, that what the federal government gave it could always take away”. Laws could be undermined by lax enforcement; funding could be choked off; and a Park Service staffed with loyal experts could be shaken by political appointees who didn’t believe in its mission. Watt epitomized the reality that threats to the parks can come “from within the federal bureaucracy itself”, if those in power do not value preservation.

By the end of the Reagan era, the pendulum began to swing back somewhat. Public opinion remained strongly pro-environment (the majority of Americans consistently told pollsters they supported the EPA’s mission and clean air and water goals). Conservation groups grew in membership and sophistication, fighting destructive proposals in courts and in Congress. Reagan’s successor, President George H.W. Bush, though a Republican, styled himself as an “environmental president” to an extent – signing amendments that strengthened the Clean Air Act in 1990 and supporting international conservation efforts. Still, the 1980s had demonstrated how fragile environmental gains could be when ideological winds shift. The parks had largely withstood that storm, but they emerged with chronic problems: underfunded budgets, maintenance backlogs, and unresolved policy tensions about tourism vs. preservation. These problems set the agenda for the next administration.

Renewal and Retreat: Parks Policy from Clinton to Obama

The 1990s brought a renewed emphasis on preservation with President Bill Clinton, even as political battles continued. Clinton’s Interior Secretary, Bruce Babbitt, was an ardent conservationist who believed in using executive powers to protect lands when Congress was unwilling. Faced with a hostile, Republican-led Congress after 1994 (whose leaders at times threatened deep cuts to environmental programs and even floated selling off public lands), Clinton and Babbitt turned to the Antiquities Act – echoing Theodore Roosevelt – to create new national monuments by presidential proclamation. In one notable stroke, Clinton established Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah in 1996, protecting 1.7 million acres of redrock canyons and forest – and also blocking a proposed coal mine on those lands. Utah politicians were furious at what they saw as federal “land grabs” done in secret, but conservationists hailed it as a bold move to save a unique landscape. By the end of his term, Clinton had created or expanded two dozen national monuments (many of them historic or natural sites ranging from California’s Giant Sequoia groves to Arizona’s Sonoran Desert). He also presided over the preservation of vast stretches of wilderness-quality land through administrative rule (such as the 2001 “Roadless Rule” protecting millions of acres of national forests from logging roads). In terms of national parks, Clinton signed legislation for a few new park units and significantly increased funding – NPS appropriations rose from about $1.4 billion in 1992 to $2.0 billion in 2000, allowing parks to address some maintenance and hire more rangers. The Park Service in the 1990s also began embracing a broader mission of telling inclusive historical stories – such as new park sites dedicated to civil rights and women’s history – reflecting the nation’s growing interest in preserving not just wilderness but culture and history. This aligned with the blog author’s values of historical preservation and inclusion.

However, not all was smooth sailing. The 1995 federal government shutdowns (triggered by budget standoffs between Congress and Clinton) famously closed national parks for weeks, highlighting how parks could become pawns in partisan budget fights. Visitors were outraged to find gates locked at icons like the Grand Canyon and Statue of Liberty. The episode underscored how vital stable funding is to keep parks open and protected – and how disruptive political impasses can be. It arguably helped galvanize public support to treat parks as “essential,” leading to budgets that generally grew in the late 90s. By 2000, there was a sense of momentum: the U.S. had weathered the anti-park mood of the 80s, and now both parties often spoke of the importance of parks (for example, Congress unanimously passed the National Parks Omnibus Management Act in 1998 to improve resources management and science in parks). The new century would start with the national parks enjoying record visitation and bipartisan praise. But lurking challenges remained – especially the maintenance backlog (dilapidated roads, visitor centers, trails) that had ballooned as parks aged, and the creeping threats of climate change and pollution which respected no park boundaries.

The 2000s saw mixed fortunes. President George W. Bush, while less overtly antagonistic to parks than Reagan, brought a philosophy of deregulation and industry-friendly policy that sometimes clashed with conservation goals. The Bush administration pushed for energy development on public lands (including near park borders) and tried to soften some park policies – for instance, reversing a Clinton-era plan to phase out snowmobile use in Yellowstone, and promoting commercial access in some parks. Still, Bush also signed significant park legislation: the creation of Great Sand Dunes National Park (2004) and Congaree National Park (2003), and he launched the largest marine protected areas at the time (Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument in Hawaii, 2006). By the end of Bush’s term, the parks’ budgets were stagnating and staffing levels dropping due to across-the-board federal belt-tightening, even as visitation climbed. Morale in the Park Service suffered, with many rangers feeling that science and conservation were not priorities under some political appointees.

Then came Barack Obama, who embraced environmental protection as a pillar of his agenda. Obama took office in 2009 amid great hopes for action on climate change and restoration of scientific integrity in policymaking. For the national parks, the Obama years were largely positive. His administration reversed or halted a number of Bush-era initiatives seen as harmful (for example, eventually setting stricter limits on snowmobiles in Yellowstone and canceling drilling leases near national parks like Arches). Obama also leaned heavily on the Antiquities Act, establishing or expanding 34 national monuments, more than any of his predecessors. Notably, he created monuments that recognized diverse facets of American heritage – Stonewall National Monument in New York (commemorating LGBTQ history) and Charles Young Buffalo Soldiers NM – and massive natural conservation areas like Bears Ears in Utah, a 1.35 million-acre landscape sacred to Native American tribes. Obama also protected vast ocean areas, expanding the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument to encompass over half a million square miles of the Pacific. In 2016, as the Park Service celebrated its 100th anniversary, Obama signed legislation (the National Park Service Centennial Act) that boosted funding through public-private partnerships and created an endowment to help address the backlog. Still, one of Obama’s signature environmental policies – the Climate Action Plan – was stymied by Congress, and comprehensive climate legislation never passed, leaving parks increasingly vulnerable to the rising threats of wildfires, droughts, and other climate-driven changes without a coordinated national response.

By 2016, the stage was set with a stark contrast: decades of progress in expanding and diversifying the park system, often through executive action and bipartisan legislative support, versus a growing partisan divide where one side’s conservation gains could be swiftly targeted by the other side’s deregulatory zeal. The 2016 election of Donald Trump brought that contrast into sharp relief. Park advocates braced for another round of rollbacks reminiscent of the 1980s, if not more severe given the extent of environmental rules enacted under Obama. And indeed, Trump’s first term would prove to be a tumultuous time for public lands.

Trump’s First Term (2017–2021): “Energy Dominance” vs. Conservation

Donald Trump entered office in 2017 with an explicit agenda to dismantle what he viewed as burdensome regulations – and environmental rules were high on the list. Over his four years, the Trump administration rolled back or weakened over 100 environmental regulations, touching everything from climate policy to wildlife protection. In the realm of national parks and public lands, Trump’s approach was often described as prioritizing “energy dominance” over conservation. Within months, he set in motion an unprecedented review of national monument designations. By executive order, Trump tasked the Interior Department with scrutinizing 27 national monuments (mostly those established since 1996) for possible downsizing or elimination. This led to the largest rollback of protected lands in U.S. history: in December 2017, President Trump issued proclamations slashing the size of Bears Ears National Monument by 85% and Grand Staircase-Escalante by about half, stripping protections from over 2 million acres of redrock canyons, archaeological sites, and wildlands in Utah. Internal emails later revealed that mining and drilling interests had strongly influenced those decisions, eyeing the possibility of extracting uranium, coal, and oil from lands that had been inside the monuments. While those monuments lay outside the strict boundaries of national parks, they are part of the broader public land heritage – and their gutting sent shockwaves through the conservation community. Other monuments on the original review list, from Katahdin Woods and Waters in Maine to Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks in New Mexico, were spared outright reduction at the time, but the message was clear: no recent protected area was truly safe from political whim.

At the same time, the administration moved to open up more federal lands to resource exploitation. It eased restrictions on oil and gas leasing on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and even some National Park Service lands (for instance, by allowing drilling in Big Cypress National Preserve in Florida and pushing to open sections of Arctic National Wildlife Refuge adjacent to national parklands in Alaska to oil drilling). Environmental safeguards were peeled back: the Endangered Species Act’s implementing rules were weakened to make it harder to protect critical habitat and easier to delist species, and the National Environmental Policy Act’s regulations were overhauled to expedite permitting by limiting environmental reviews and public input. One change, for example, allowed federal projects with minimal federal funding or involvement to skip NEPA review – potentially including pipelines or infrastructure near park lands, so long as they could be framed as mostly private ventures. The EPA under Trump rolled back Clean Air Act rules that helped keep smog and haze out of national parks, and reversed Clean Water Act expansions, which raised concerns about pollution in park watersheds. Climate change was given a particularly cold shoulder: the term “climate change” was scrubbed from many agency websites and reports, and NPS staff were reportedly discouraged or outright muzzled from discussing climate science. Dr. Patrick Gonzalez, a climate scientist in the Park Service, noted that during Trump’s first term, officials “denied fundamental science on public health, the environment, and climate change,” leading some employees to self-censor their communications rather than face retaliation.

Within the National Park Service itself, the Trump era was marked by turmoil in leadership and workforce. The agency went nearly the entire term without a Senate-confirmed Director. Instead, a string of acting directors rotated, which one commentator called “organized chaos” for an agency of 20,000 employees. More troubling, the administration undertook a series of personnel moves seemingly designed to sideline or push out veteran park managers. Esteemed superintendents and regional directors were reassigned across the country to inconvenient posts – leading some, like Yellowstone’s Superintendent Dan Wenk and the Intermountain Regional Director Sue Masica, to retire early rather than uproot their lives. This tactic, which had echoes of the Nixon era “purges” of inconvenient civil servants, was seen as a way to trim ranks and install more compliant managers. By 2019, many senior Park Service leaders were gone. In late 2020, Trump even signed an executive order (known as Schedule F) that aimed to strip civil service protections from thousands of federal employees classified as policy-making – a move widely interpreted as enabling the firing of staff deemed “disloyal.” Although that order was never fully implemented and was rescinded by President Biden, it exemplified the administration’s mistrust of the bureaucracy. Park Service employees braced for potentially sweeping layoffs.

Despite these adversities, there were a few silver linings for parks during Trump’s first term, often driven by Congress or public support. In 2020, a bipartisan coalition in Congress passed the Great American Outdoors Act (GAOA), which President Trump signed – a landmark law providing up to $9.5 billion over five years to tackle the maintenance backlog in national parks, as well as permanently funding the Land and Water Conservation Fund (a program for land acquisition and grants). This was a rare moment of agreement: Republicans and Democrats alike saw the value in fixing crumbling trails and visitor centers, and Trump touted it as an achievement in an election year. The GAOA’s passage showed that the public’s love for parks could still drive bipartisan action, even when environmental issues were otherwise polarized. Another outcome was that some of Trump’s more controversial plans were slowed or blocked by lawsuits and public pushback. His reduction of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, for example, was immediately challenged in court as illegal (plaintiffs argued the Antiquities Act gives presidents authority to create monuments, not shrink them). Before any court could rule, the 2020 election intervened and the outcome changed the course.

Biden’s Tenure (2021–2025): Restoration and New Initiatives

Under President Joe Biden, who took office in January 2021, there was a concerted effort to reverse Trump’s rollbacks and advance a proactive conservation agenda. Biden wasted little time: within his first year, he restored the original boundaries of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments, fully reinstating the protections that Trump had removed. He also re-established protections for the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument off New England, which Trump had opened to commercial fishing. Biden’s Interior Department halted plans for drilling on the edges of national parks and refuges – for instance, suspending oil leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (a step which indirectly safeguarded the neighboring Gates of the Arctic National Park from industrial road incursions for a time). Importantly, Biden sought to rebuild trust in science at the agencies. The phrase “climate change” returned to websites and reports, and Park Service staff were encouraged to incorporate climate adaptation into planning. One former Park Service climate expert, Dr. Gonzalez, moved to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy to help restore scientific integrity, a telling reversal from his sidelining under Trump.

Biden also advanced new conservation initiatives aligning with his broader “America the Beautiful” goal of protecting 30% of U.S. lands and waters by 2030. He designated several new national monuments, often with strong local and Indigenous support. Notably, in August 2023, Biden established the Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni – Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument in northern Arizona, protecting a vast area from new uranium mining and honoring the sacred tribal lands around Grand Canyon National Park. This move was lauded by tribal nations and environmentalists and enjoyed broad public approval (polls showed two-thirds of Arizonans supported a mining ban around the Grand Canyon). Biden’s team also finalized rules to restore wildlife protections that Trump had removed – for example, a new regulation in 2022 re-banned certain predator hunting practices (like baiting bears or killing wolf pups in dens) on Alaska’s national preserves, undoing the Trump-era allowance of those controversial methods. In essence, the Biden period aimed to reaffirm the core conservation mission of the parks and public lands, and to address long-standing issues like climate resilience, tribal co-stewardship of ancestral lands, and equity in access to parks.

However, Biden’s ambitions were constrained by a divided Congress and other crises (like the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021). Major environmental legislation (such as a climate bill with public lands provisions) had to be trimmed or fell short. The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 did inject funding for climate and conservation programs, but not specifically targeted at national parks’ operational needs. By 2024, parks were again seeing record visitation as Americans and international tourists flocked to natural areas post-pandemic – 2024 saw over 331 million visits to the park system, an all-time high. This was a double-edged sword: great for public appreciation, but straining park resources. The Park Service workforce had not fully recovered from the previous cuts; many positions remained vacant due to hiring freezes or slow HR processes. Still, there was optimism that with stable leadership (Biden did appoint a Senate-confirmed NPS Director, the first in years) and supportive policies, the parks were on a path to better stewardship.

As the 2024 presidential election approached, it was clear that the future of the national parks – and the values they represent – hung in the balance. Biden’s policies demonstrated one philosophy: that protecting natural and historic treasures is a moral obligation and a bipartisan legacy to uphold, and that science and public input should guide decisions. The opposing philosophy, articulated by Trump and his allies, framed many protections as red tape to cut, and viewed public lands primarily as economic resources to “unlock.” When Donald Trump won the 2024 election and prepared to return to power in January 2025, park supporters braced for another dramatic swing of the pendulum. What followed in the first months of 2025 has indeed been dramatic – a test of whether the parks’ legacy can withstand yet another political onslaught.

The Second Trump Presidency (2025): Renewed Threats to “America’s Best Idea”

When Donald Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, few within the environmental and historical preservation communities held illusions. The first days of his second presidency confirmed the fears: a wave of executive orders, staffing purges, and deregulation efforts quickly signaled that the national park system was once again in political crosshairs. But if his first term had already demonstrated a willingness to undercut environmental protections, his second has gone further—adopting a strategy not merely of rollback, but of systematic dismantling.

The first blow came swiftly with a federal hiring freeze that led to the cancellation of over 5,000 seasonal job offers for the National Park Service—an essential workforce for peak summer operations. Within weeks, internal memos revealed that 2,300 probationary Interior Department staff were being dismissed, including around 1,000 Park Service employees. Managers across the system warned of critical gaps in trail maintenance, campground services, and interpretive programs. Park leaders were even stripped of basic purchasing authority, unable to secure fuel or cleaning supplies without central approval. As record-breaking visitation loomed—331 million park visits in 2024—this gutting of personnel left the system brittle, overextended, and demoralized. One former superintendent called it “a hollowing-out of the Park Service from within,” not due to budget constraints alone, but as a political statement about the role of government itself.

That statement was amplified when the administration released its 2026 budget proposal. It called for slashing over a billion dollars from the NPS—nearly 40% of the agency’s funding—gutting everything from operations to historic preservation. The proposal went even further, suggesting that dozens or even hundreds of federally managed sites could be “divested” to state control. It was a move without precedent in the modern era. For over a century, national parks have represented a compact between the federal government and its people: that some lands are too precious to be surrendered to short-term interests or uneven state resources. To discard that principle is to unmake not only policy, but heritage.

At the same time, the White House revived its earlier crusade for “energy dominance.” In February, President Trump signed an executive order directing Interior to prioritize mineral extraction on public lands, fast-tracking mining permits and weakening the already frayed process of environmental review. Nearly any material—gold, coal, even sand—could now be reclassified as “critical,” opening the door to mining interests in areas once considered safe. Among the targeted zones were lands adjacent to Grand Canyon National Park, where uranium deposits have long tempted industry. Biden-era protections were quietly revoked, including the 20-year mining moratorium near Minnesota’s Boundary Waters—an ecosystem often likened to a freshwater Yellowstone. Meanwhile, the Interior Department began a new review of several national monuments, clearly eyeing opportunities to shrink or revoke them in the name of economic utility.

Nowhere was this agenda more nakedly revealed than in the Mojave Desert, where the BLM approved mining operations inside Mojave National Preserve—territory legally managed by the Park Service. The company involved had racked up over $200,000 in fines for previous damage to protected habitat. Instead of facing further penalties, it was rewarded with administrative cover. It was, quite simply, a breach of legal norms, and a warning: in the current climate, even long-established protections can be bypassed by fiat.

Yet this administration’s project extends beyond ecosystems to history itself. In March, Trump signed an executive order calling for a review of all federally managed monuments and historical sites to ensure they do not “promote partisan or unpatriotic narratives.” The language was vague but the intent unmistakable: to chill or reverse recent efforts to tell fuller, more difficult American stories—those of slavery, Indigenous dispossession, civil rights, and cultural pluralism. Staff at the Park Service reported quiet instructions to modify interpretive exhibits. Mentions of LGBTQ+ figures at Stonewall, or the role of slavery in Civil War sites, began disappearing from web pages. Internal emails described a “return to a celebratory-only tone.” Historians and interpreters, long praised for their work in expanding the public’s understanding of the past, now found themselves navigating ideological red lines. One warned, “We’re not interpreting history anymore—we’re managing optics.”

This parallel campaign to erase or soften uncomfortable truths was further symbolized by plans to revoke two new national monuments in California: Chuckwalla, in the southern desert, and Sáttítla Highlands, in the Klamath Mountains. Both had been established by President Biden in the final days of his term, following years of tribal advocacy and ecological studies. Their reversal would be not just unprecedented—it would be legally dubious. No president has ever outright eliminated a national monument created by a predecessor. The move faces immediate court challenges, but the signal is clear: even sacred lands and bipartisan victories are up for political repurposing.

Climate science has not been spared. Park Service staff report that climate adaptation programs have been halted, language scrubbed, and researchers sidelined. The administration has revived efforts to remove climate impact requirements from environmental assessments, and internal guidance discourages even the use of the term “climate change” in public-facing materials. The Park Service’s climate response program, which once supported wildfire preparedness and resilience projects, now sits unfunded and leaderless. As record-breaking wildfires threaten Yosemite and sea-level rise endangers historic Jamestown, the federal agency tasked with protecting these places is being actively stripped of the tools to do so.

All of this is happening quickly—and largely by design. The Project 2025 playbook, drafted by conservative think tanks during Trump’s years out of office, envisioned exactly such a rapid overhaul of the federal bureaucracy. What was theoretical in 2020 is now reality: a presidency that sees the national parks not as a trust for the American people, but as assets to be trimmed, rebranded, or leased.

Yet there remains something enduring in the parks themselves. For all the bureaucratic havoc and legal reversals, the landscapes remain—scarred, perhaps, but still speaking. The silence of an alpine lake in Glacier. The echo in a canyon in Zion. The historical gravity at Little Rock Central High. These places do not belong to any one administration. They belong, in law and spirit, to the people.

But they will not defend themselves. And if this second Trump term has shown anything, it is that even the most sacred institutions can be eroded—quietly, swiftly, and without broad consent. That makes it all the more urgent for Americans across the political spectrum to remember what the national parks truly are: not just natural wonders, but democratic promises. Not just scenery, but history—held in common, for all.

Conclusion: Upholding the Parks — A Democratic Agenda for Preservation

The threats facing America’s national parks in 2025 are not simply about land or nature. They are about governance, memory, and the legitimacy of public goods in an era of polarization and deregulation. As someone who writes from outside the United States but deeply believes in the civic ideals that shaped the national park system — stewardship, historical truth, democratic accountability — I view the current crisis not as the end of a legacy, but as a stress test. Can a republic built on public trust still protect the best of what it inherited and created?

The national parks were once a point of pride across political lines. Today, they risk becoming collateral damage in a broader assault on federal institutions and public culture. If they are to survive and thrive, they need more than public affection. They need legal guarantees, financial stability, and resilient civic ownership. Here is a practical, forward-looking agenda — rooted in bipartisan possibility, but firm in its convictions — to preserve “America’s best idea” as a cornerstone of democratic life.

• Reaffirm the National Parks as Civic Infrastructure

Parks are not just recreational amenities. They are sites of national identity, public health, and economic resilience. Elected officials — from both parties — should treat parks as essential infrastructure, deserving of strategic investment. A bipartisan congressional resolution could explicitly affirm their civic role, helping reframe conservation as a matter of national interest, not ideological preference.

• Enshrine Legal Protections Against Political Volatility

To reduce the vulnerability of parks to executive rollback, Congress must act. The Antiquities Act should be clarified: only Congress should have the power to revoke or substantially reduce national monuments. Key statutes — including the Organic Act — should be amended to enshrine scientific integrity and historical accuracy as protected principles. No future administration should be able to erase historical truth or censor climate science by fiat.

• Secure Stable, Bipartisan Funding for Staffing and Maintenance

Financial precarity makes the Park Service an easy target. Congress should create a dedicated National Parks Trust Fund, drawing from diversified sources (mineral royalties, tourism levies, private partnerships) and protected from appropriation. The Great American Outdoors Act must be renewed and expanded, with a clear mandate to address the backlog and support permanent staffing. Seasonal hiring freezes must be permanently exempted for core public services like parks.

• Expand State and Tribal Partnerships Without Abdicating Federal Duty

Handing parks to the states is not a solution — it’s an abandonment. But meaningful partnerships are possible. Co-management agreements with tribes, and administrative coordination with state agencies, can enhance stewardship while preserving federal authority. Congress could formalize the role of Tribal Advisory Councils for relevant park units, ensuring continuity and accountability across administrations.

• Guarantee Transparency and Restore Public Input

The 2025 rollbacks have too often occurred in the shadows. A strengthened NEPA framework should mandate real public consultation for all major decisions involving national park units. Minimum comment periods (e.g. 60 days), regular publication of climate impact assessments, and revitalization of independent advisory boards would help restore accountability. A scientific integrity law could protect NPS employees and researchers from political interference.

• Mobilize Local and Bipartisan Civic Coalitions

Every member of Congress has constituents who rely on park sites — economically, culturally, and emotionally. A pragmatic strategy is to build local coalitions (tourism stakeholders, veterans’ groups, faith communities, educators) to oppose cuts, closures, or privatization schemes. Emphasizing shared values — freedom, heritage, responsibility — can bridge ideological divides and re-anchor the parks as a national consensus.

• Address Climate Resilience Without Ideological Deadlock

Climate change threatens the long-term viability of many parks. But resilience investments can be framed as commonsense risk management: protecting sequoias from wildfires, fortifying coastal sites, funding ecological corridors. Parks are also part of the solution: they sequester carbon, educate the public, and buffer communities from environmental shocks. Congress should fund climate adaptation as a bipartisan infrastructure priority, not a partisan debate.

If the national parks can be gutted by political whim, then no part of the civic commons is truly safe. But if they can be defended — by citizens, lawmakers, professionals, and coalitions rooted in shared responsibility — then they remain a living proof of democratic strength. I may not be American, but I believe deeply in what the parks represent. Their future will not be decided solely in courtrooms or boardrooms, but in the choices Americans make — to legislate with foresight, to govern with integrity, and to steward with pride.

These lands do not belong to any one party or president. They belong, as Roosevelt reminded us, to all of us — not just legally, but spiritually.

Bibliography

Keiter, Robert B. To Conserve Unimpaired: The Evolution of the National Park Idea. Washington, DC: Island Press, 2013.
Righter, Robert W. The Battle over Hetch Hetchy: America’s Most Controversial Dam and the Birth of Modern Environmentalism. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Runte, Alfred. National Parks: The American Experience. 5e éd. Lanham, MD: Lyons Press, 2021.
Sellars, Richard West. Preserving Nature in the National Parks: A History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997.
Spence, Mark David. Dispossessing the Wilderness: Indian Removal and the Making of the National Parks. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.
Stuckey, Mary E. For the Enjoyment of the People: The Creation of National Identity in American Public Lands. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2024.

US Politics and History is a blog for those who believe democracy deserves better than outrage,and history offers more than nostalgia. It’s a place to reconnect analysis with responsibility, and debate with decency.