Trump Just Donated His Entire First-Quarter Salary To The National Park Service

Susan Walsh / AP

President Trump on Monday donated his first-quarter salary to the National Park Service, delivering on a promise he made last year to give away his salary as chief executive.

Trump's donation to the NPS amounted to $78,333.32, which represents his salary since taking office in January. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer announced the donation during a news conference, during which he displayed a check from Trump.

Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke also appeared at the news conference and said the money would be spent supporting "infrastructure on our nation's battlefields."

The White House

"We're about $229 million behind in deferred maintenance on our battlefields alone, and that's on our 25 national battlefields," Zinke said.

Neither the White House nor the Interior Department immediately responded to BuzzFeed News requests for additional details.

Monday's donation delivered on a promise Trump made both while campaigning and after winning the election to donate his constitutionally mandated salary, which is currently $400,000 a year.

"No, I’m not gonna take the salary," he told 60 Minutes in November. "I’m not taking it."

The money did not, however, win over some of Trump's critics. In a statement, the Sierra Club noted that the president has "proposed slashing the Department of the Interior’s budget by 12%, which includes the National Park Service."

Civil War re-enactors skirmish at Gettysburg in 2013.

John Moore / Getty Images

“If Donald Trump is actually interested in helping our parks, he should stop trying to slash their budgets to historically low levels," Executive Director Michael Brune said. "This publicity stunt is a sad consolation prize as Trump tries to stifle America’s best idea."

The donation and criticism underlies that this is a pivotal, and controversial, time for public lands. Trump promised during his campaign to roll back regulations, for example, including ending the "war on coal" — much of which centers on mining on public land. During Monday's news conference, Zinke said the administration had succeeded on that front.

"We also stopped the war on coal by continuing the coal leasing program," he said, later arguing that coal production makes the US more secure and less reliant on foreign energy.

However, neither Zinke nor Trump have indicated how they plan to deal with a myriad of other controversial public lands issues, many of which have roiled western states in recent years. Chief among those issues are President Obama's national monument designations — particularly Bears Ears National Monument in Utah — which some conservatives want Trump to rescind.

Zinke has not said how he plans to handle that issue, but did stress access to public lands Monday and said that he gets "inspiration from Teddy Roosevelt" — who signed the law letting presidents create national monuments in the first place.

LINK: Outdoor Companies Are In A Fierce Battle With Republicans Over Obama’s National Monuments

LINK: Trump "Open" To Unprecedented Repeal Of Obama National Monument

from BuzzFeed - USNews http://ift.tt/2ouWuST