That’s a great way to discourage tourism dollars.
Yeah TBH I always figured that part of his policy impact was just a casualty but he appears to actually have it out for the tourism industry.
There wasn’t any danger of me coming to spend my money in that third world shithole anyway.
I’m sure having to have your ID checked when visiting your own national parks won’t have anything to do with ICE. This will impact Americans more than it will by costing a few extra dollars for international visitors.
Trump is just stupid. Many countries that rely on tourism do this, they have free or near free entry for citizens and ~$20-100 entry for foreigners. This helps them generate a significant portion of their annual budget.
I haven’t verified these numbers, but quick searching days that roughly 14–15 million foreign tourists visit U.S. national parks each year, accounting for about 4% of total park visits. If we charge $20 per person for international visitors, that’s $280–300 million annually… that’s… Peanuts for the US.
I wouldn’t be opposed to it at all if the fees are only used to preserve and maintain the national parks, but you know this fucker just wants to funnel the money into deep pockets.
Which countries charges $20-100 for visiting an equivalent of a national park or museum? Not questioning you, but curious.
There are places that charges a tourist tax that is for everyone not living there and paid through the hotel or tourist apartment.
I had this happen in India, although I don’t know if it was the particular site or if it was a general policy. I saw it as paying less than I would have paid for a comparable museum at home, while citizens are encouraged to connect with their heritage. I was fine with it.
But the US is an expensive place, so you’re only making it unobtainable. National parks should not be a profit center, and I barely agree with charging anyone. I especially disagree with requiring ID, making this logically unenforceable.
And of course I’d expect this to turn into racism really quickly.
Once he finishes logging, mining and drilling them, not many people will want to visit America’s National Parks, anyway.
It’s actually getting kind of hard to think of new, stupider ways to ruin the economy and raise the cost of living. Parody is getting close to being indistinguishable from reality.
- Blanket tariffs for goods with low domestic production? Done.
- Imprisoning laborers who do domestic farming? Yes.
- Deporting legal, tax-paying noncitizens? Yep.
- Pissing off citizens of countries that contribute significantly to local tourism? Indeed.
- Asking potential tourists to pay extra for the privilege of visiting a to-be-sold-for-industrial-logging park? Why not.
- Cutting healthcare and replacing it with a bonus for the 0.001%? Might as well!
“To fund improvements and enhanced experiences across the park system, I’ve just signed an executive order to raise entrance fees for foreign tourists while keeping prices low for Americans. The national parks will be about America first.”
Oh thank god! After slashing over $1 billion from the nps budget and firing over 5,000 of its workers I was beginning to think this guy maybe didn’t care about the national parks. What a relief!
Amazing that a hotel owner hates tourism that much.
I don’t see how this is meant to ensure the law is fairly governed, nor where the constitution or legislature told the president that they could change pricing for parks. It isn’t pertaining to war, and it’s a pretty damn hard to see how this pertains to international affairs.
Everyone in the government has to know this executive order shouldn’t exist. Wish the Supreme Court had the integrity to just vet every executive order and suspend all of them that could be overreach upon being placed until they are reviewed.
Wut.
