The National Park Service (NPS) is charged with stewarding what author and environmentalist Wallace Stegner called America’s “best idea.” 

From the striking expanse of the Chihuahuan Desert, partially contained in Big Bend National Park, to the towering stone walls of Yosemite, the United States government has the privilege of caring for some of the most overwhelmingly beautiful vistas in the world. 

For more than 100 years, recreational fees have been collected at a subsect of our National Parks to explicitly and specifically support the management and responsible stewardship of these lands on behalf of present and future generations.

WASHINGTON — Today the Revolving Door Project released a report examining the National Park Service’s distribution of awards out of its Recreational Fee account so far in 2025-2026 as compared to 2023-2024. 

Using publicly accessible databases, found a startling 1673.23 percent increase in spending out of the rec fee account to fund projects in D.C., while spending to the nation’s top-ten most visited fee-collecting National Parks dropped by 75.52 percent. 

And, so far during 2025-2026 we found that D.C.-based contracting spending is far outpacing spending at the nation’s top 10-most visited fee-collecting parks AND our top 10-most visited non-fee collecting parks combined.

As our stories this week illustrate, there are plenty of examples of how Trump’s corruption is making our lives demonstrably worse — from mining and oil extraction pollution that threatens the health of our communities and monopolists’ tightening stranglehold on our pockets and labor to corrupt machinations attacking our increasingly fragile democracy.

Why should you care about this obscure office with a funny name and the investment banker to whom Trump is entrusting it? Meet Kevin Lilly, Trump’s nominee for Assistant Secretary for Fish, Wildlife, and Parks of the Interior Department.