In March 2025, President Donald Trump released an executive order that aims to “remove history and science from national parks,” which was put into fruition by Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum in May 2025.
In the middle of February 2026, six environmental groups — National Parks Conservation Association, American Association for State and Local History, Association of National Park Rangers, Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks, Society for Experiential Graphic Design and Union of Concerned Scientists — filed a countersuit through Democracy Forward to put a halt in the order’s efforts.
Trump’s Executive Order 14253, titled Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History, works to remove history and science from national parks that “distort(s) our shared history.” The order cites shifts in content that happened during previous jurisdictions that had worked to provide a more diversified perspective on American history, calling the result of these changes “divisive,” “inherently harmful” and “oppressive.”
The goal of EO14253 is to “remind Americans of our extraordinary heritage, consistent progress toward becoming a more perfect Union, and unmatched record of advancing liberty, prosperity and human flourishing.” In doing so, it aims to erase mentions of race and the role it’s played in American history.
Secretary Order 3431, filed in May 2025 by Burgum, instructs the National Park Service to review, remove or restructure their signs and exhibits for changes done during previous jurisdictions and for inappropriate content.
“I think (the order is) un-American because we can handle the truth, we want to know the complexities that make it up because that’s the things that make it interesting and compelling,” Alan Spears, the senior director for cultural resources at NPCA, said.
One of the most integral parts of Spears’ role is to ensure that parks are making a conscious effort to “represent the true stories of America” and to preserve the “really special places” that are the national parks.
“We need to understand how we got to where we are now. And we can only understand that if we know the real history of what happened,” Emma Schroeder, an assistant professor of history at UT, said.
She adds that, to discuss the true history of America, these conversations need to include everybody who resides in this country, even if it’s uncomfortable for some.
“I think history is incredibly important, and I’m not sure that enough people understand the mighty role that the National Parks Service plays in preserving and managing our national history,” Spears said.
“I’ve used them, and I think as much as me using them, knowing that they’re representing the correct history or like what actually happened matters to me, too,” Schroeder said.
Since the National Parks Service was first founded in 1916, they’ve prided themselves by being the “best outdoor education center in the country,” Bill Wade, the executive director of ANPR, said.
“They’ve provided accurate, truthful and complete information to the visitors and the public, so with this effort to try to erase or change the accuracy of some of that information has been disappointing to those in the park service,” Wade said. “It’s almost like a dagger to the heart of the real purpose of what the national park employees do.”
The NPS encompasses over 400 units of the national parks system, preserving historical sites and monuments across the United States. In addition, their Heritage Documentation Project uses a mixture of drawings, photographs and written records to preserve the history of over 45,000 historic sites.
As part of the NPCA lawsuit, they listed 27 different parks that have had signs or exhibits flagged for removal across topics of black history, scientific information and indigenous history. The suit claims the removals downplay the importance of slavery in American history and the continuous mistreatment of Indigenous peoples.
“By taking away signs related to … Native American erasure, and national parks did require removing native peoples from their ancestral homelands … that has to be part of understanding the creation of these spaces set aside as nature. Because if you don’t do that, their descendants are living with us still today too. Like, how can we not acknowledge that that’s part of their own history?” Schroeder said.
Some argue the removal of information from the parks targets the history of non-white struggles with colonialism throughout history, such as indigenous tribes being removed from their land and acknowledgments of slavery.
“The arbitrary and precocious nature of the signage removals runs contrary to the wellbeing of our national parks,” Spears said.
These changes aren’t just at major monuments, but target parks in 21 states of various sizes. The Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee had a plaque removed that discussed how fossil fuels cause air pollution.
“The president directed federal agencies to review interpretive materials to ensure accuracy, honesty and alignment with shared national values. At Great Smoky Mountains National Park, as with all parks, staff were asked to identify materials that might warrant clarification. Elevating an item for consideration does not mean it violates the order, and it does not mean it will be changed. In the vast majority of cases across the system, flagged materials remain unchanged,” NPS said in a statement.
“Our main function is to serve as the leading voice of the American people on behalf of their national parks, so we’ve always cared about parks, we’ve always worked to make good policies,” Spears said.
It is this idea that brought the six organizations together. While the legal proceedings declare them a coalition, Spears wouldn’t describe them as such.
“They’re just a gathering of people who are very concerned about not just the president’s order from early 2025 but also the sanitization of history,” Spears said. “Sanitization is a censorship, it’s unnecessary, and it’s un-American … and because it’s unnecessary and un-American, we want to see it stopped right here and right now.”
Wade adds that the ANPR was one of the first organizations to sign on to become a plaintiff, as many members within ANPR are also members of the NPS.
“We’re also very much concerned (about) what’s happening to the employees of the National Parks Service because of this, how they’re being treated, and doing our best to, to try to, you know, help the employees as much as we can through this very difficult time that’s going on,” Wade said.
For the calendar year of 2025, The NPS reported 323 million recreational visits, a decrease of 2.7% from the year before. In February 2025, 1,000 of their workers got laid off and another 3,400 U.S. Forest Service workers fired as well, leaving parks short-staffed and unable to operate to full capacity.
“I mean, everybody loves our national parks. It doesn’t really matter your political persuasion, right? Like, you like to go out there. I do. And they also were a way of, like, they’re preserving our heritage, they’re preserving our environments, you know? And they’re providing educational resources that we all need,” Schroeder said.
The suit was filed on Feb. 17 by Democracy Forward, and at the moment they’re waiting on a court decision before being able to proceed.
“We are hoping for swift action that puts a stop towards the removal of signage from our national parks,” Spears said.
Wade adds that in addition to stopping the removal, he hopes that the NPS will restore any changes back to what they were before EO14253 was carried out.
“I hope that the court will find that the action taken has been illegal and that it requires that no further action will be taken … and that there will be no further removals of anything. And that the court orders the Department of the Interior and the National Parks to restore all of those. And that it has to be replaced, whether its signs or exhibits or brochures or videos, whatever has already been taken away, that it needs to be restored to where it was before the action taken by the Department of the Interior,” Wade said.
