President Trump on Monday vowed to rename Alaska’s 20,310-foot Denali, North America’s highest mountain, back to Mount McKinley, reigniting a long-standing dispute.
“We will restore the name of our great president, William McKinley, to its rightful place on Mount McKinley,” President Trump said after taking the oath of office at the U.S. Capitol on Monday.
President Trump also said he plans to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America and indicated he would sign an executive order implementing the change on his first day in office.
President Trump described McKinley, the 25th president of the United States, as a “natural businessman” and praised the former president for “making our country so rich with his tariffs and his talent.” McKinley, a Republican, also expanded the territory of the United States in response to the Spanish-American War.
In 1896, prospectors named the peak Mount McKinley in honor of presidential candidate William McKinley, and the name stuck. But the name has been dogged by disagreement for decades.
In 2015, then-President Barack Obama redesignated Denali, a name long supported by Alaskans. The name means “Great One” in Koyukon-Athabascan, the language of the Alaska Native peoples.
The pledge to rename Denali was opposed by environmental groups and Alaska politicians, including Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski.
“There’s only one name worthy of North America’s tallest mountain: Denali, the Great Mountain,” Murkowski wrote to X after President Trump mentioned the plan in a speech last month.
“No! That’s Denali!” Alaska State Sen. Scott Kawaski, D-Del., wrote last month alongside a photo of a snow-capped mountain in Blue Sky.
The conservation group Sierra Club said renaming the peak “goes against the wishes of Alaska Native people, Alaska’s elected officials, and centuries of tradition.”
“The people of Koyukon have known this mountain as ‘Denali’ for centuries, and even state elected officials oppose attempts to change the mountain’s name,” the Sierra Club said. Land Conservation Program Director Ahsan Manuel said in a statement. “It’s clear that Donald Trump is more interested in culture war stunts than addressing the concerns of the American people.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), an ardent supporter of President Trump, last week drafted a bill to effect name changes to federal maps and executive policies, CBS New reported. He said he would instruct his staff to do so.
According to the National Park Service, debate over the mountain’s name dates back more than 100 years, before the national park in which it looms was established.
The team drafting the bill to create a park to protect wildlife could not agree on its name. One of the people involved, a hunting naturalist, insisted that the park be called “Mountain.” It was named Denali National Park in 1916, taking its name from the name given to the mountain by Native Americans.
The federal government finally poured oil on Mount Martin, a peak in the Alaska Range. McKinley National Park was established in 1917 in honor of the president who served from 1897 until his assassination in 1901. This park became Mount McKinley National Park.
The debate resurfaced in 1975, when the state of Alaska called for the mountain to be called Denali. This change was blocked for decades, but in 1980 the park was renamed Denali National Park and Preserve.
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