NEW: Doug Burgum Concentrates Power at Interior, Transfers Thousands of Staff to Personal Office While Screwing Over America’s Parks

As Burgum TRIPLES His Personal Staff, America’s Parks And Public Lands Have Never Been Under Greater Threat

HELENA, MT – Interior Secretary Doug Burgum is concentrating absolute power for him and him alone, to benefit himself at the detriment of our country’s parks and public lands. One in seven employees at Interior now work directly for Burgum, as he has quickly transferred 5,000 positions to the Office of the Secretary in just nine months. 

At the same time, Burgum has cut almost 10,000 positions from the overall department, including nearly 25% of all national park employees, without even bothering to call for a National Park Service director nominee. While Burgum forces his newfound 5,000 “personal staff” to cater to his every whim, our parks and public lands have never been worse off, after draconian DOGE firings, Trump’s historic shutdown, and Burgum’s dereliction of duty. The additional 30% budget cut proposed by the Trump administration to the department could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

“Doug Burgum is running the Interior Department like his personal fiefdom, using extraordinary governmental resources and tax dollars to ensure that his employees cater to his every whim, whether it’s staffing his dinner parties, baking him cookies, or using a U.S. Park Police helicopter as his personal transportation with no transparency and limited oversight,” said Save Our Parks spokesperson Jayson O’Neill. “Under Secretary Burgum, our parks and public lands are getting screwed, forced to operate on skeleton crews and shoestring budgets. Billionaire diva Burgum’s ‘staff for me, not for thee’ attitude is emblematic of the rot at the heart of his failed leadership, where serving the American people always comes second to personal luxuries on the taxpayer dime.”

The breaking news of Burgum tripling his personal staff, as he’s squarely focused on America’s exterior and jet-setting to international destinations to broker domestic energy export deals at great expense to U.S. consumers, follows new polling showing how unhappy Americans are with Burgum’s fail-by-design plan to sell off public lands and privatize national parks. 

The unprecedented personal staffing increase for Burgum is consistent with all the cronies he’s already hired who are operating in secrecy, without legally-required ethics or financial disclosures. Wealthy Texas investment banker Kevin Lilly, tasked with overseeing the park service and fish and wildlife, is just one of the many operatives under Burgum operating with complete anonymity. Trump’s nomination of former New Mexico Representative and public lands sell off enthusiast Steve Pearce to head the Bureau of Land Management ended any doubt about the administration’s and Burgum’s ultimate sell off and privatization plans. 

To speak with Save Our Parks spokesperson Jayson O’Neill, email jayson@focalpointstrategygroup.com. 

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