NATIONAL PARKS TRAVELER • April 30, 2026
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum insisted this week that efficiency could make up for a 40 percent reduction to the National Park Service maintenance budget, and vowed that a proposed $10 billion "Presidential Capital Stewardship Program" would not fund projects like President Donald Trump's massive proposed triumphal arch in Washington. Along with Park Service cuts, Trump's budget request asks Congress for a $10 billion “Presidential Capital Stewardship Program” dedicated to the nation’s capital. Burgum insisted the funds are intended for maintenance. Yet the amount dwarfs the roughly $2 billion that the Interior Department has estimated is the amount of the Park Service's deferred maintenance backlog for Washington. "There's [sic] no dollars that are in that project for future theoretical proposed projects," the secretary replied when asked by Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, what the additional $8 billion was for and whether the money would fund the so-called Independence Arch that Trump wants to build in Washington.