Published November 14, 2026 03:33AM
With Democrats slated take control the House of Representatives and Senate on January 3, the Trump Administration is advancing multiple policies that could impact U.S. national parks and other public lands.
Among the proposals are a sweeping selloff of territory controlled by the Interior Department, the limiting of public input on decisions made by the Bureau of Land Management, and a dramatic restructuring of the National Park Service (NPS), among others. The plans have sparked strong criticism from nonprofits, conservation groups, and lawmakers.
“It feels like they’re trying to rush this stuff through in the dark of night,” Edward Stierli, vice president of government affairs for the National Parks Conservation Association, told Outside. “We know they’re trying to move on these reorganizations before the end of the year because they know in 2027 there will be a higher level of accountability.”
Here’s a look at some of the controversial public lands policies that the administration is considering.
A Dramatic Reorganization of the National Park Service
On November 7, The Washington Post published a report stating that the Department of Interior (DOI) was planning a dramatic restructuring of both the National Park Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Citing internal DOI documents, the WaPo stated that DOI officials are considering “pending duty station changes” to the locations where NPS staff work. Outside reached out to the DOI for comment but did not hear back prior to the publishing of this story.
The report comes two months after the Washington Sun reported that the DOI was considering realigning its 433 NPS units under a so-called hub-and-spoke management model. Currently, all 433 NPS units retain some autonomy in making their own decisions.
Under the proposed model, decision-making power would be centralized at larger parks, while smaller “spoke” park units would lose some power.
Stierli told Outside that there’s already regional hub-and-spoke models around resource sharing in the NPS that are effective. But moving to a sweeping hub-and-spoke management model would likely lead to the loss of staff and expertise at smaller sites.
“When you go to Flight 93 National Memorial in Pennsylvania the tour you get there is incredible; it makes everyone cry, because it was designed by someone who is steeped in the history there,” Stireli said. “If you were to move that position to a different park, or to a variety of different parks, you’re not going to get the same level of expertise.”
Even if the hub-and-spoke model doesn’t move forward, other plans are afoot for the agency. In its new strategic plan for 2026 to 2030, the DOI highlighted a move to “consolidate its workforce to advance operational efficiencies.” The agency has already been crippled by consolidation: in 2025, the NPS lost nearly a quarter of its full-time staff to buyouts and layoffs.
A Plan to Sell Off Huge Swaths of Public Land
On November 11, the DOI published a sweeping strategic plan for 2026 through 2030 that outlines the department’s large-scale path for managing the 11 agencies under its control, including the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
In his opening letter DOI secretary Douglas Burgum said the agency’s primary focus was to make public lands available for the country’s goals around energy production and industry.
The document also stated that the DOI would “work to decrease the size of the federal estate by offering to states, localities, and Tribes the opportunity to purchase federal lands.”
“Through these sales, the Department will be able to focus its resources on primary federal responsibilities and nationally significant federal lands,” the plan states.
The proposal to sell public lands drew sharp objections from critics.
“Secretary Burgum’s plan threatens the lands where families hike, camp, hunt, and fish, the wildlife habitats that sustain our ecosystems, and the natural, cultural, and historic treasures we have a responsibility to protect for future generations,” Loren Blackford, executive director of the Sierra Club, said in a statement. “The administration should be investing in protecting our public lands and the people who steward them, not looking for ways to shrink and block public access to them.”
This is the Trump Administration’s second attempt at a sweeping sale of public lands. In June 2025, Utah Senator Mike Lee spearheaded a plan to sell 3 million acres of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service. The plan was ultimately torpedoed amid mounting bipartisan opposition.
Changing the BLM Rules to Limit Public Comments
On November 10, the Bureau of Land Management published a proposal titled Revision of Regulations for Planning, Programming, Budgeting that includes a series of foundational changes to the way the agency proceeds with public land decisions. The BLM manages 245 million acres of public land, more than any agency.
At the top of the list would be limiting the public’s ability to comment on the BLM’s plans for parcels of public lands, and eliminating the agency’s need to produce a document called an Environmental Impact Statement, which outlines how the move will impact the local flora and fauna, prior to a change.
Currently, the public gets 90 days to comment on major changes to the way the BLM manages land. The proposal would shrink this to 30 days, or replace a comments period with public meetings in some situations.
Steve Pearce, the director of the BLM, said the changes would streamline the BLM’s process for approving new projects.
“The current planning process is too slow, too complicated and weighed down by outdated requirements,” Pearce said in a statement. “These proposed changes would help the BLM make decisions more efficiently, reduce costs for taxpayers and improve coordination with the people and communities that rely on public lands.”
But critics argue that the 90-day public comments period is an imperative.
“Gutting transparency, review, and public engagement requirements within the West’s most ecologically sensitive wildlife corridors, watersheds, and cultural resources are the actions of cowards trying to fast-track industrial development at any and all social costs,” said Kara Matsumoto, senior policy director at the Conservation Lands Foundation, in a release.
The Big Bend Border Wall Continues
Advocates in Texas are awaiting the return of bulldozers and trucks to Big Bend National Park, where the construction of a barrier along the U.S.-Mexico border has been on hold since September.
On November 9, the U.S. Supreme Court voted to allow the construction to continue, overriding the decision of a federal judge who had ordered it to stop. In October, the Trump Administration filed papers to challenge the order and fast-track the case to the Supreme Court. With the approval, the administration is likely to continue a project that’s been criticized by locals, Texas law enforcement, and even state politicians.
