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us department of interior
Watchdog Sues Trump Interior Dept, Demanding Transparency on Freedom 250 Funding
"America’s 250th anniversary celebration is supposed to be an occasion for strengthening public trust in our democratic institutions," said one advocate. "Freedom 250 is a privately managed slush fund."
May 12, 2026
As the 250th anniversary of the United States' independence approaches, a government watchdog group is warning that the Trump administration has refused to release key documents regarding President Donald Trump's Freedom 250 project, in which the White House has partnered with corporations including Palantir and ExxonMobil to organize what it's called "a celebration of America like no other."
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) filed a lawsuit Monday against the Department of Interior (DOI) in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, more than two months after the group filed multiple Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests regarding the funding of the "controversial and secretive" Freedom 250 initiative.
As the agency that oversees the National Parks Service, DOI and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum are playing a major role in the organization of Freedom 250, with the celebration including projects like the National Garden of American Heroes, the proposed Freedom 250 Grand Prix at the National Mall, and the proposed Independence Arch.
In late February, PEER's FOIA requests sought information from DOI on reports that public funds are being directed to Freedom 250 through the congressionally chartered National Park Foundation, "with no transparency, no accountability, and no guardrails."
“America’s 250th anniversary celebration is supposed to be an occasion for strengthening public trust in our democratic institutions, not eroding it,” Tim Whitehouse, PEER’s executive director, said late Monday. “In contrast, Freedom 250 is a privately managed slush fund... It epitomizes what is wrong with politics today."
In its lawsuit, PEER said the DOI "has failed to make a final determination on any of PEER’s FOIA requests and has failed to disclose any of the requested records within the time stipulated under FOIA."
The department has failed to respond to the requests as reports have mounted that Trump is using Freedom 250 to:
- Divert $100 million in taxpayer funds from America 250, the congressionally mandated 250th anniversary entity, without congressional approval;
- Sell access to the president for up to $2.5 million;
- Seek foreign donations, including at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland where Freedom 250 CEO Keith Krach was seen promoting the project to foreign state actors in a leaked video;
- Use public employees to promote the private entity, including by pressuring DOI employees to include Freedom 250 logos and links in their official email signatures—a possible violation of the Hatch Act as well as workers' First Amendment rights; and
- Use taxpayer funds to push a partisan agenda, with DOI removing a slavery exhibit from Independence Park in Philadelphia as well as references to the internment of Japanese Americans and the oppression of Native Americans from other National Park Service sites ahead of the anniversary.
In its lawsuit, PEER noted that the DOI was required to respond to the FOIA requests by March 20, but communications from the department have indicated officials plan to respond no sooner than August 3—after the main 250th anniversary celebrations occur.
Whitehouse said DOI's failure disclose information about the funding mechanisms for Freedom 250 continue "a pattern of Secretary Doug Burgum dispensing with a variety of legal safeguards to improperly facilitate Trump projects—particularly around the nation’s capital."
"Just look no further than his more than $1 billion ballroom or vanity projects, such as the arch," said Whitehouse.
Burgum has pushed for the construction of a 250-foot arch in Washington, saying it "embodies American freedom." Trump has said the project could be paid for by private donors, while veterans groups and historians have filed legal challenges over the proposed project, arguing Congress needs to approve its construction.
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Amid Energy Crisis of His Own Making, Trump Slammed for Using Taxpayer Money to Cancel Wind Projects
"We the taxpayers are going to pay companies $900 million... to NOT build wind power at a time when electricity prices are spiking and we need more clean power?" said one expert.
Apr 28, 2026
President Donald Trump's administration this week shelled out even more US taxpayer money to get energy firms to cancel planned renewable energy projects.
As The New York Times reported, the US Department of the Interior on Monday announced plans to reimburse energy companies a combined $885 million in exchange for forfeiting their leases to build wind farms in federal waters off the coasts of New York, New Jersey, and California.
The companies involved in the projects have promised promised to invest in fossil fuel energy projects, "including liquefied natural gas facilities along the Gulf Coast," the Times reported.
The agreements with the energy companies are similar to a deal the administration struck earlier this year with French firm TotalEnergies, which agreed to forfeit its leases for projects off the coasts of New York and North Carolina in exchange for $928 million that would be plugged into fossil fuels.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) blasted the administration for killing the projects planned off the coast of his state, decrying "a reckless decision that hurts working families and the economy."
"Once again, Donald Trump is attacking New York offshore wind at the behest of his fossil fuel donors with no justification," Schumer said.
Costa Samaras, director of the Carnegie Mellon University Scott Institute for Energy Innovation, expressed disbelief that the administration was killing clean energy projects at a time when Americans are suffering from surging gas prices, which on Tuesday hit their highest level in four years.
"Hold on," he wrote in a social media post. "We the taxpayers are going to pay companies $900 million, which is more than six times what we spend on wind power research and development, to NOT build wind power at a time when electricity prices are spiking and we need more clean power?"
New polling suggests that Trump's blanket opposition to wind power projects is becoming politically costly.
As Gizmodo reported on Tuesday, a recent survey conducted by GOP public opinion research firm the Tarrance Group found that "nearly three-quarters (74%) of voters favor the construction of offshore wind projects off the coast of their own state, with majorities favoring in every state surveyed."
The poll found that even Republican voters have grown more supportive of wind power projects, with support for offshore wind rising by 30 percentage points over the last year.
In its analysis of the poll, the Tarrance Group said that more voters have come around to supporting offshore wind due in part to "ongoing concerns about energy prices," which have spiked since Trump launched an illegal war with Iran in February.
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Another Giveaway to Big Oil as Trump Wrenches Open 13 Million Acres of Arctic for Drilling
"The Trump administration is trying to take us back in time with its reckless fossil fuels agenda."
Nov 14, 2025
The Trump administration on Thursday killed Biden-era rules that protected around 13 million acres of the western Arctic from fossil fuel drilling, another giveaway to the industry that helped bankroll the president's campaign.
The decision by the US Interior Department, led by billionaire fossil fuel industry ally Doug Burgum, targets the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A). Last year, the Biden administration finalized rules that shielded more than half of the 23-million-acre NPR-A from drilling.
Conservationists were quick to condemn the repeal of the rules as a move that prioritizes the profits of oil and gas corporations over wildlife, pristine land, and the climate.
Monica Scherer, senior director of campaigns at Alaska Wilderness League, ripped the administration for ignoring the hundreds of thousands of people who engaged in the public comment process and spoke out against the gutting of NPR-A protections.
“Today’s actions make one thing painfully clear: this administration never had any intention of listening to the American people," Scherer said Thursday. "By dismantling these protections, Interior isn’t ‘restoring common sense,’ it’s sidelining science and traditional knowledge, silencing communities, and putting irreplaceable lands and wildlife at risk."
Earthjustice attorney Erik Grafe called the administration's weakening of Arctic protections "another example of how the Trump administration is trying to take us back in time with its reckless fossil fuels agenda."
"This would sweep aside common-sense regulations aimed at more responsibly managing the Western Arctic’s irreplaceable lands and wildlife for future generations," said Grafe. "It rewinds the clock to regulations last updated in 1977. This is no way to secure our future.”
"Where others see the most ecologically intact landscape in the United States, the Interior Department sees another American treasure poised for ruination."
Thursday's move came less than a month after the Trump administration announced plans to open Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for drilling. At the time, Burgum declared, "Alaska is open for business."
ConocoPhillips, the oil and gas giant behind the much-decried Willow project that the Biden administration approved in 2023, is among the possible beneficiaries of the Trump Interior Department's decision to roll back drilling protections in the western Arctic.
Inside Climate News reported earlier this week that ConocoPhillips "has applied to extend ice roads and well pads farther west into the Arctic wilderness beyond its Willow oil project."
"The company also wants to build roads to the south of Willow, where it would use heavy-duty equipment to thump the ground with seismic testing searching for crude," the outlet added.
Bobby McEnaney, director of land conservation at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said Thursday that the Trump administration's latest attack on Arctic protections "is nothing more than a giveaway to the oil and gas industry."
"Weakening protections is reckless, and it threatens to erase the very landscapes Congress sought to safeguard," said McEnaney. "Where others see the most ecologically intact landscape in the United States, the Interior Department sees another American treasure poised for ruination.”
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