President Donald Trump’s administration is considering giving a section of the renowned Yosemite National Park to a private developer, a lawyer for the company confirmed to AFP on Friday (August 28, 2026).
The National Park Service has been holding talks with Nevada-based Kingsbarn Realty Capital to build an access road from an 83-acre private property just outside the park to Yosemite’s entrance, in exchange for land elsewhere, lawyer Lanny Davis said.
The news was first reported by the outlet NOTUS and caused an uproar among conservationists and opposition Democrats, who have fiercely objected to moves by the administration to roll back protections of public lands — including pushing to reinstate road building and logging in national forests. “The new access road would be safer for drivers and generate substantially less vehicle emissions. He also stressed that the land exchange proposal — which would involve supplying Yosemite National Park with a parcel of land elsewhere — “is expressly provided for under federal law and will not reduce the land area of the park.
“Without a direct access route, every trip from the Hazel Green area requires a significantly longer drive — twice as long, at a minimum — on unpaved forest roads and thus more air pollution,” Mr. Davis said. “Any land exchange or access proposal involving National Park Service lands would be subject to all applicable federal laws, regulations and Departmental policies, including required environmental review and public notification processes,” the agency said, adding: “No final decisions have been made. “The Trump administration’s attempts to dismantle America’s conservation legacy are now taking aim at Yosemite with this secretive, backroom deal,” said Mark Rose, the group’s senior Sierra Nevada program manager. Democratic Senator Adam Schiff of California, a fierce critic of Trump, said in a statement: “Yosemite is one of California’s natural wonders, and must be protected from further development.
