|
The Trump administration has sidelined the official, bipartisan organization set up to commemorate the nation’s 250th anniversary and created a financial black box that has received at least $10 million in taxpayer funds while also soliciting millions more from donors whose identities may never be released.
Reporting from The New York Times reveals that Freedom 250, President Donald Trump’s hand-picked replacement for the official America250 celebration, is selling direct access to President Trump, including photo opportunities with the president, for $1 million and up. Freedom 250 is also partnering with right-wing political and Christian nationalist groups, including PragerU and Hillsdale College, to create content for six "Freedom Trucks" that are traveling the country at taxpayer expense.
E&E News previously reported that Interior Secretary Doug Burgum instructed the Interior department to switch all semiquincentennial branding to Freedom 250, sidelining the bipartisan America250 organization that Congress created in 2016.
"It’s completely inappropriate for Secretary Burgum to force Interior department employees to take part in the blatant influence-peddling at Freedom 250," said Aaron Weiss, deputy director at the Center for Western Priorities. "The Freedom 250 logo, and all of the corruption that it represents, should not be in government email signatures or plastered across the visitor centers that are supposed to serve all Americans, regardless of their faith or politics."
In Sunday's New York Times story, a spokesperson for Freedom 250 claimed that "Freedom 250 is not accepting foreign donations." This is contradicted by Freedom 250 CEO Keith Krach, who spent the World Economic Forum at the Freedom 250-branded "USA House" in Davos, Switzerland, publicly soliciting foreign partners for Freedom 250.
The House Natural Resources Committee is holding a hearing on Tuesday to discuss public-private partnerships in the semiquincentennial celebration. Witnesses at the hearing are expected to include representatives from the four congressionally-chartered foundations that partner with the Interior department. The National Park Foundation, which has been commandeered by Trump loyalists, is acting as the pass-through for money going to and from Freedom 250.
How Congress is weaponizing the Congressional Review Act against public lands
In the latest episode of CWP's podcast, The Landscape, Kate and Aaron discuss how Congress is using the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to overturn public land management plans, creating chaos and uncertainty for federal lands. Steve Bloch from the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance explains that the CRA, originally designed to review agency rules, is now being weaponized to repeal resource management plans and even national monument plans like the one in place for Grand Staircase-Escalante, despite these never being treated as “rules” before. Listen now, watch on YouTube, or subscribe on Apple Podcasts. You can learn more when Kate joins an emergency webinar in defense of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument at 6:00 pm Mountain Time tonight.
|
We're here just to confront what Trump's trying to do. We want to teach our youth our history. That's why we got the signage up there.”
