According to a report from CBS News, President Trump signed an executive order Thursday calling on the national park system to charge higher entry fees for foreign visitors.
It instructs Interior Secretary Doug Burgum — who oversees the National Park Service — to “develop a strategy” to hike entrance fees and recreation pass fees for non-U.S. residents at any national park that currently charges for entry.
“To fund improvements and enhanced experiences across the park system, I’ve just signed an executive order to raise entrance fees for foreign tourists while keeping prices low for Americans,” Trump said in a Thursday evening rally in Iowa. “The national parks will be about America first.”
CBS News has reached out to the Interior Department and the National Park Service regarding when the fee hike may take effect or how much the surcharge for nonresidents could cost.
In its 2026 fiscal year budget proposal released in May, the Interior Department estimated that such a surcharge would generate more than $90 million annually.
Not all national parks charge an entrance fee, and for those that do, the fee varies. Generally, visitors can purchase either a standard daily or weekly pass to one specific park, or an annual pass that can be used at one park or in a certain region of the country. The Park Service also offers a more comprehensive “America the Beautiful” pass, which costs $80 and can be used at all national parks nationwide.
Some of the National Park Service’s most popular sites — like Yellowstone, Yosemite and the Grand Canyon — charge entrance fees of $20 per person or $35 per vehicle.
Trump also ordered the Interior Department to give U.S. residents “preferential treatment” over foreign visitors regarding “recreational access rules, including permitting or lottery rules” that parks might have in place. The order did not detail what those preferential treatment rules would entail, but some popular national parks have reservation systems for entry and camping during peak seasons.
The order Thursday also revoked a memorandum signed in January 2017, at the tail end of former President Barack Obama’s second term, which sought to promote diversity and inclusion at national parks. The move appeared to be part of the ongoing effort by the Trump administration to scale back the federal government’s diversity efforts.
The latest moves come as the Trump administration has sought to reduce the size of the National Park Service’s staff. It laid off about 1,000 Park Service employees in February as part of its push, led by the White House’s Department of Government Efficiency, to enact large-scale personnel and budgetary cuts across the federal government.
Click here to read the full report from CBS News.
