\n<\/p>\n
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum<\/span> recently tried, unsuccessfully, to feed cinnamon Altoids to a Park Police horse. Also, Burgum enjoys artificial intelligence, in particular \u201cAI Teddy,\u201d a planned exhibit at a new facility scheduled to open<\/a> on July 4 at Theodore Roosevelt National Park. And, it seems, he likes the band Creed<\/a>.<\/p>\n Those are among the idiosyncratic pieces of information communicated by Burgum during an 88-minute address Wednesday at an \u201cAll-Hands\u201d meeting held for around<\/a> 70,000 Interior Department employees.<\/p>\n In many ways, the Interior Department seems to be struggling. The Trump administration is working to slash the budget and workforce of department components like the US\u00a0Geological Survey and National Park Service. But Burgum on Wednesday touted the department\u2019s \u201cadministrative efficiency.\u201d And, in often discursive remarks wending through DOI programs, he made various calls for reducing \u201cred tape\u201d and \u201credundancies.\u201d<\/p>\n I watched video of Burgum\u2019s remarks and heard from Interior Department employees, who, on the condition of anonymity, provided fact-checking, and mockery, of the secretary\u2019s address.<\/p>\n Some pointed out the irony of Burgum causing thousands of federal employees with more pressing tasks to sit through a hour-and-a-half harangue on operating efficiently. It\u2019s not clear how many DOI employees attended event in person or virtually. The department\u2019s press office didn\u2019t respond when asked how many people were on the call.<\/p>\n Employees pointed out that the first half of Burgum\u2019s speech\u2014organized around slides touting the words, \u201cGratitude,\u201d \u201cHumility,\u201d Curiosity,\u201d and \u201cCourage\u201d\u2014largely repeated remarks Burgum made about a year ago at a previous departmental all-hands meeting. One department employee said that Burgum had even repeated some of the same anecdotes from the prior year. Employees also noted that for the second year in a row, as the meeting concluded, the Creed song \u201cHigher<\/a>\u201d played in the auditorium.<\/p>\n Among notable asides was Burgum\u2019s description of his encounter with Sibbell<\/a>, a US Park Police horse that eats Altoids. Burgum informed the Interior Department that he had encountered the mare during a recent event celebrating plans for the NFL to hold its 2027 draft on the National Mall. \u201cI pull out the Altoids, my favorite\u2026cinnamon Altoids,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd she did not even blink. It was like: \u2018I could care less about your cinnamon Altoids.’\u201d<\/p>\n The upshot of the anedote was that Sibbell (like many<\/a> horses) prefers mint-flavored candy. But it was also part of lengthy celebration of the Park Police, one component of Interior Department that is receiving more money under Trump. Burgum said that was due to that agency helping the Interior Department to play \u201ca massive part\u201d in the president\u2019s effort to \u201cget DC safe and beautiful.\u201d<\/p>\n That is a euphemistic reference to the deeply<\/a> unpopular<\/a> occupation of Washington, DC that Trump began last year. As part of that effort, Burgum\u00a0deputized<\/a> immigration agents\u2014who are part of the Department of Homeland Security\u2014to accompany Park Police officers patrolling National Park land in DC. The Park Police helped<\/a> ICE agents by conducting traffic stops on federal roads and property in the district, in what critics charge<\/a> was<\/a> racial profiling.<\/p>\n Park Police also helped carry out Trump\u2019s push to remove homeless encampments in DC. Burgum said Wednesday the agency had \u201celiminated 82 homeless camps.\u201d And he claimed that occurred without \u201ca front page story and barely a back page story in the Washington Post<\/em>. It wasn\u2019t even covered.\u201d<\/p>\n In fact, the Post<\/em> and other<\/a> outlets<\/a> reported<\/a> extensively<\/a> on<\/a> the<\/a> homeless camp removals in stories that noted<\/a>, contrary to Burgum\u2019s claims Wednesday, that many of the people ousted from tents on federal land did not<\/a> receive<\/a> services, or beds in local shelters. Large numbers remain<\/a> unhoused and some appear<\/a> to have returned to their former camps.<\/p>\n But the secretary did not tarry on on such wrinkles. In his remarks, he touted Rwanda\u2019s and Ecuador\u2019s park management as worthy of US emulation. \u201cIf you\u2019re an American and you wanted to go see the gorillas in Rwanda, or you want to go to the Galapagos Islands, get ready to pay about $800 a day,\u201d Burgum said, in a justification for new fees on foreigners at national parks that critics argue<\/a> are hurting<\/a> tourism.<\/p>\n On Burgum\u2019s instructions, the department is<\/a> removing<\/a> hundreds of signs and exhibits about American history and science from federal sites to comply with a Trump order to ensure placards are \u201cuplifting\u201d and free of \u201cimproper ideology.\u201d As I\u2019ve reported<\/a>, the purge includes a sign at Fort Laramie in Wyoming about a funeral the US Army held for the daughter of a Lakota chief; signs at Glacier National Park about wildfires, wolves, and the use of dams to support agriculture; and placards at Big Bend National Park about fossils and geology.<\/p>\n But the Park Service is planning to open a new library at an entrance to Theodore Roosevelt National Park in Burgum\u2019s home state of North Dakota as part of the 250th anniversary celebration. And Burgum on Wednesday sounded especially jazzed that the library plans to give visitors the chance to play \u201cthat parlor game, which figure in history would you like to have dinner with?\u201d<\/p>\n An \u201cAI Teddy,\u201d Burgum said, will answer questions using words Roosevelt wrote or spoke during his lifetime. It\u2019s unclear whether that will include racist statements Teddy made<\/a> about Black people (\u201cinferior to the whites\u201d) or Native Americans (\u201cI don\u2019t go so far as to think that the only good Indian is the dead Indian, but I believe nine out of every 10 are\u201d).<\/p>\n Burgum, who last year signed<\/a> a memorandum of understanding with the United Arab Emirates to collaborate on artificial intelligence, touts the technology as a way for the department to improve efficiency. \u201cIf you\u2019re concerned about AI taking your job, then I would just say learn how to use AI and, and, and your job will get better,\u201d he said Wednesday.<\/p>\n Amid the DOGE-driven firing of thousands of National Park Service employees, that agency had lost nearly a quarter of its workforce by mid-2025. Much of the department faces new proposed budget cuts. For a number of remaining employees\u2014many of whom say<\/a> they feel overworked and beset by ill-advised initiatives<\/a> from the Trump administration\u2014Burgum\u2019s touting of \u201cadministrative efficiency\u201d landed poorly. \u00a0<\/p>\n Burgum \u201chas implemented 1,700 bureaucratic hurdles on everything we do,\u201d one DOI employee wrote. \u201cNo exhibits or social media posts without approval. No travel without approval. Credit card limits\u2026This is the main dissonance of his entire message.\u201d<\/p>\n The all-hands event included awards to department employees who had excelled at cutting \u201cred-tape,\u201d and a QR code for \u201cInterior\u2019s Innovation & Red Tape Reduction Survey.\u201d That form allows agency employees to identify inefficiencies \u201cin the context of mission delivery at Interior\u2026that, if solved, could result in demonstrable improvements in your daily work life and in benefits to industry or the American public.\u201d<\/p>\n The form is publicly accessible, and the Resistance Rangers, a group \u00a0of current and former National Park Service employees, this week asked<\/a> its followers to weigh in and send Burgum a message: \u201cfund our parks and stop censoring science and history.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Meanwhile the department is racing<\/a> to<\/a> open<\/a> federal lands to mining. And Interior is hurling<\/a> billions<\/a> of dollars and no-bid<\/a> contracts<\/a> toward<\/a> what critics call<\/a> \u201cvanity projects\u201d tied to Trump\u2019s plan for MAGA-style celebrations<\/a> of America\u2019s 250th anniversary. Those festivities will include a UFC fight at the White House on the president\u2019s 80th birthday and an Indy Car race around the National Mall.<\/p>\n