Kaizen Investigation: Four Presidents Are Crumbling in Stone - And the Fifth Has His Face Printed on an Entrance Pass

On the eve of America's 250th birthday, Donald Trump will travel to the Black Hills of South Dakota and stand beneath four faces carved in stone. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt - each sixty feet tall, carved into granite nearly a century ago. Trump will deliver a speech about a great nation. Towering above him will be a monument that is slowly falling apart, and no one on that stage will mention it.

The National Park Service estimates that Mount Rushmore alone faces a deferred maintenance backlog of $57 million. That is the smaller number within a much larger one. By the end of fiscal year 2025, the nationwide backlog had grown to more than $24.2 billion - monuments, parks, trails, and buildings waiting for funding that never arrives. America is allowing to decay what it once built to endure forever. And while the granite continues to crumble, money intended to preserve it is flowing into a city far removed from South Dakota.

According to our reporting and parallel findings presented by Democratic lawmakers in both chambers of Congress, the Trump administration has redirected tens of millions of dollars in National Park Service fee revenue into what they describe as Trump's vanity projects. Fountains in Lafayette Square. A ballroom on the East Wing of the White House. The Reflecting Pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial. Projects that have drawn criticism because Congress was never consulted and contracts were awarded without competitive bidding. A review of federal contracting records uncovered one detail that speaks for itself. Twenty days before Trump publicly announced the restoration of the Reflecting Pool, the administration had already committed $8.5 million to the project. The president spoke of $2 million. The actual amount was more than four times higher and had already been awarded before the promise was ever made. The announcement was not the beginning. It was the backdrop for something that had already happened.

Read also our investigation: Trump Conceals Millions in Costs at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool

How far this reaches becomes clear through an analysis of government contracting data pointing to a total of $95 million in taxpayer funds for beautification projects within sight of the White House. Buried inside that figure are two line items that force the reader to stop and make sure they have read them correctly. Five million dollars, awarded without competitive bidding, for equestrian statues covered in nearly pure gold leaf. Another five million dollars, also awarded without competition, simply to repave the base surrounding a single marble statue. Sixty million dollars in visitor fee revenue is being funneled into the restoration of nine ornamental fountains. One contract illustrates just how small the circle of beneficiaries really is. $17.4 million, awarded without competition, for two fountains in Lafayette Park, granted to the very same company that is simultaneously constructing the White House ballroom.

The Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act of 2004 is unambiguous on one point. At least 80 percent of entrance fees collected on site must remain in the park where they were generated. The remaining 20 percent may be used to support parks that do not charge admission. The system is orderly, transparent, and self-contained. But a second source of revenue follows different rules - the digital America the Beautiful Passes sold online. The law does not prescribe how that money must be spent. It does not say where it has to go. And it is precisely within that silence of the law, where no rule exists, that suspicion takes root.

In a letter before us dated June 10, Senators Adam Schiff and Martin Heinrich write to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum. Nine additional senators signed the letter: Angus King, Ben Ray Luján, Kirsten Gillibrand, Ron Wyden, Edward Markey, Jack Reed, Michael Bennet, Jeff Merkley, and John Hickenlooper. Credible sources with direct knowledge, they write, have informed Congress that a substantial portion of the revenue from online pass sales - possibly all of it - is being directed into Trump's beautification projects in Washington. According to the letter, that money is not reaching the nation's national parks. For individual parks, that could mean the loss of millions of dollars, leaving park managers without funds they would otherwise have available to maintain their facilities. The lawmakers demand answers by June 23. What share of the online pass revenue is being consumed by these projects? How much money from the National Park Service fee account has been transferred to Washington since December 2025? Why have contracts repeatedly been awarded without the competitive bidding required by law? One question cuts deeper than the others because it is not about money, but about silence. Why were contractors allegedly instructed not to speak to the press, and were they likewise forbidden from speaking to Congress? Anyone who distributes money while simultaneously ordering those who receive it to remain silent is not acting like someone who merely fears scrutiny. They are acting like someone who has something to hide.

The Department of the Interior avoided the question. Asked about the alleged diversion of entrance fee revenue, it responded that it has many funding sources available for deferred maintenance. Spokeswoman Katie Martin added a sentence that did not address the issue itself but revealed everything about the administration's posture. Unlike Barack Obama, who spent millions in recession relief that should have gone to struggling families, the Trump administration is exploring multiple funding sources, including foundation funds and revenue from pass sales. The question concerns the present, yet the answer attacks a predecessor. Anyone who responds to a straightforward question that way is not answering it. They are changing the subject. And deflection is rarely the behavior of someone with nothing to hide.

Beginning January 1, 2026, America's natural treasures will become significantly more expensive for international visitors. Nonresidents without an annual pass will pay an additional $100 per person on top of regular admission to enter eleven of the country's most visited national parks. The annual pass will cost foreign visitors $250, while Americans will continue to pay $80. Interior Secretary Burgum justifies the policy with a familiar argument. American taxpayers, who already finance the system, should continue to enjoy affordable access, while international visitors should pay their fair share toward its preservation. The Department promises that the additional revenue will flow back into the parks. Into improvements. Into long overdue maintenance. It is a promise that is difficult to verify as long as allegations persist that the very same revenue is being diverted elsewhere. A promise about money whose path no one is willing to disclose is little more than words.

And then there is the detail that would sound invented if it did not come directly from the Department's own announcement. The new passes feature updated artwork that, according to the Department, celebrates America's landscapes and heritage. One of those passes places two presidents side by side. George Washington - and Donald Trump. The man who places himself beside the nation's first president while the monument honoring four presidents carved into stone waits for the $57 million it still does not have.

At that point, the story ceases to be about public budgeting. A monument is an act of defiance against time. People carve faces into a mountain because they want to preserve something that will outlive their own deaths - a declaration that meaning endures longer than the individual who proclaims it. Anyone who allows such a monument to weather away while simultaneously placing his own face on a piece of paper sold at the ticket counter has reversed that order. What is permanent is allowed to decay. What is temporary is promoted. That is the difference between someone who wants to leave behind a legacy and someone who simply wants to be seen while he is still here.

Spokeswoman Martin added one final point. Revenue from pass sales, she said, had increased during the first three months from $13.7 million to $14.3 million. It is a number intended to project strength. Instead, it demonstrates how much money flows through this system - and how legitimate the question has become of where it ultimately ends up. Trump will stand at Mount Rushmore beneath four men who were carved into a mountain because they represented something greater than themselves. He will speak about America while, behind him, the granite continues to crumble in silence, at the pace of decades. Meanwhile, in an online store, visitors will be able to purchase an entrance pass featuring Trump beside Washington. Two images of the same nation, existing at the same moment. Which one endures will not be decided by the speech delivered that day.