EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK, FLORIDA - APRIL 17: A National Park Service sign welcomes visitors to Shark Valley, part of the Everglades National Park, on April 17, 2025 in Everglades National Park, Florida. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
OAKLAND, Calif. - Senator Alex Padilla on Friday joined with 11 other senators to question the Trump Administration’s plans to modernize access to the National Parks, including putting Trump's face on the annual America the Beautiful passes.
Among the changes the senators are concerned about are the National Parks Service’s decision to redesign of the 2026 America the Beautiful national park annual passes, on which photographs of nature or historic buildings have been replaced with images of the president. That decision, they argued, may be illegal — federal law requires an annual, open public competition to determine the pass designs.
Changing days
They also criticized the removal of Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth from the list of fee-free days, while adding Trump’s birthday to the list, a move they called "self-celebration," and "aggrandizing."
"Not only does this send the deeply troubling message that these days of profound historical importance in the struggle for civil rights are not worth honoring, but it also further promotes the President’s agenda of self-celebration," the senators wrote in a letter to Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum. "These changes do nothing to modernize how people visit national parks and are instead a thinly veiled attempt to use our nation’s most iconic landscapes to further the self-promotion of President Trump and disparage our shared history."
America the Beautiful passes cost $80 for U.S. citizens and $250 for non-residents. They are valid for one year and grant access to over 2,000 federal recreation sites.
Padilla and 11 other Democratic senators, including Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill) and Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), signed the letter to the Burgum, and requested answer to questions about the NPS rationale and plans for the fee-free day changes, te agency’s process for determining the redesign for the 2026 annual pass, and whether U.S. residents will be able to purchase America the Beautiful passes that do not have Trump’s face on them.
Other voices
The senators aren’t alone in their concerns.
Nonprofit conservation group the Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit in Washington D.C. arguing the image violates a federal requirement that the annual pass display the winning photograph from a national parks photo contest.
Parks visitors have also made their displeasure with the redesign known. Many visitors have taken to covering Trump’s face on the card with stickers, to such an extent the Department of Interior took notice.
A release from department staff published earlier this year stated passes would be considered void if the cardholder put stickers over Trump’s face, or otherwise altered the card.
Previous guidelines stated the cards would only be voided if the signature section on the back of the card was altered, but the new policy bars stickers on the front as well.
Protesters have found ways to work around the new policy, such as putting the card in a plastic sleeve, then placing stickers on the sleeve.
Whether or not a card is actually voided is left to the discretion of the NPS staffer working at the park a cardholder is trying to enter.