Comment: The exclusion behind National Park System’s new fees

By Leonard Greene / New York Daily News

President Donald Trump’s birthday is June 14, which also happens to be Flag Day.

To celebrate, the president wants to offer free admissions that day to the country’s national parks, a self-serving gesture, no doubt, but one that is no surprise for a man who spent much of his adult life plastering his name on the sides of buildings, airplanes and casino hotels.

But that is not a real problem. The public should take every opportunity to take full advantage of the vast offerings of the National Park Service.

The problem is that the free admission benefit is being removed next year for Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth, a blatant swipe at African Americans and the nation’s civil rights history.

“The raw & rank racism here stinks to high heaven,” Cornell William Brooks, a Harvard Kennedy School professor and a former NAACP president, wrote on social media about the new policy.

Other days of free park admission in 2026 are Presidents Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Constitution Day, Veterans Day, President Theodore Roosevelt’s birthday (Oct. 27) and the anniversary of the creation of the Park Service (Aug. 25).

The new free-admission policy takes effect Jan. 1 and was one of several changes announced by the National Park Service late last month.

Another announced change was higher admission fees for international visitors, an “America-first entry fee policy” that would charge international tourists up to an extra $100 to enter some of the most popular sites, while leaving them out of fee-free days reserved for Americans.

Foreign tourists will also see prices for their annual park passes rise to $250, while U.S. residents will continue to be charged $80.

“These policies ensure that U.S. taxpayers, who already support the National Park System, continue to enjoy affordable access, while international visitors contribute their fair share to maintaining and improving our parks for future generations,” said Interior Secretary Doug Burgum.

Could there be anything more petty than a president punishing foreign tourists? It’s a wonder he didn’t raise the fees for Black people, too.

The MLK Day and Juneteenth snubs are only the latest attacks on Blacks and people of color.

Since his first day in office again, Trump has tried to dismantle diversity across the federal government, downplaying the nation’s racist history while whitewashing the civil rights victories of Black Americans.

Trump doesn’t even try to disguise his contempt anymore.

After years of dancing around whether or not he called Haiti and other Third World hotspots “s***hole countries,” Trump leaned into the phrase and did it again.

“Remember I said that to the senators?” Trump said recently during a speech in Pennsylvania. “Our country was going to hell. And we had a meeting, and I say, ‘Why is it we only take people from s***hole countries, right? Why can’t we have some people from Norway, Sweden, just a few? Let us have a few from Denmark. Do you mind sending us a few people? Do you mind?’”

Welcome to the National Park Service. Please have your passports out for inspection.

The new entry fee policy will also be a logistical nightmare for Park Service staff. Screening visitors for nationality will only make lines longer, and increase foreign resentment.

And, I don’t like the ideal of having to prove I’m a citizen every time I want to visit the Lincoln Memorial.

Other countries, including Egypt, Thailand and Cambodia, also charge higher entry fees for international tourists to visit national parks and attractions.

But this is America. Do we really want to be like them?