US national park gift shops ordered to purge merchandise promoting DEI

The Trump administration is expanding its crackdown on diversity, equity and inclusion by ordering national parks to purge their gift shops of items it deems objectionable.

The Interior Department said in a memo last month that gift shops, bookstores and concession stands have until Dec. 19 to empty their shelves of retail items that run afoul of President Donald Trump's agenda.

The agency said its goal is to create “neutral spaces that serve all visitors.” It’s part of a broader initiative the Trump administration has pursued over the last year to root out policies and programs it says discriminate against people based on race, gender and sexual orientation — an effort that has led some major corporations and prominent universities to roll back diversity programs.

Conservation groups say the gift shop initiative amounts to censorship and undermines the National Park Service's educational mission. But conservative think tanks say taxpayer-funded spaces shouldn't be allowed to advance ideologies they say are divisive.

Employees of the park service and groups that manage national park gift shops say it's not clear what items will be banned. They didn't want to speak on the record for fear of retribution.

“Our goal is to keep National Parks focused on their core mission: preserving natural and cultural resources for the benefit of all Americans,” the Interior Department said in a statement. The agency said it wants to ensure parks’ gift shops “do not promote specific viewpoints.”

Alan Spears, the senior director for cultural resources at the National Parks Conservation Association, said removing history books and other merchandise from gift shops amounts to "silencing science and hiding history,” and does not serve the interests of park visitors.

Other groups called the review of gift shops a waste of resources at a time of staffing shortages, maintenance backlogs and budget issues.

Stefan Padfield, a former law professor who now works with a conservative think tank in Washington, said there is no way to defend the government's promotion of “radical and divisive” ideologies through the sale of books and other items, though he said the challenge for the Trump administration will be in deciding what is acceptable and what isn't.

“Now, are there going to be instances of the correction overshooting? Are there going to be difficult line-drawing exercises in gray areas? Absolutely,” said Padfield, the executive director of the Free Enterprise Project at the National Center for Public Policy Research.

All items for sale at parks and online are supposed to be reviewed for neutrality. That includes books, T-shirts, keychains, magnets, patches and even pens.

But the memo issued by a senior Interior Department official didn’t give any examples of items that could no longer be sold, leaving the order open to interpretation. No training sessions have been offered to park service employees.

Some parks had already completed their reviews, finding nothing to add to the list.

On display this week at Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia were items featuring Frederick Douglass. At the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historical Park store in Atlanta, there were various books on the Civil Rights Movement and a book for children about important Black women in U.S. history. For sale online was a metal token for the Belmont-Paul Women’s Equality National Monument.

There already is a thorough process for vendors to get merchandise into national park stores. Items are vetted for their educational value and to ensure they align with the themes of the park or historical site.

The park service in recent weeks faced criticism when it stopped offering free admission to visitors on Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth, while extending the benefit to U.S. residents on Flag Day, which also happens to be Trump’s birthday next year.

Earlier this year, the Interior Department's ordered parks to flag signs, exhibits and other materials it said disparaged Americans. That order sparked debate about books related to Native American history and a photograph at a Georgia park that showed the scars of a formerly enslaved man.

In one of his executive orders, Trump said the nation's history was being unfairly recast through a negative lens. Instead, he wants to focus on the positive aspects of America's achievements, along with the beauty and grandeur of its landscape.

Mikah Meyer knows that beauty well after a three-year road trip to visit all 419 national park sites. He said part of the mission of his travels, which he shared on social media and in a documentary, was to illustrate that parks are welcoming to the LGBTQ+ community.

That message aligns with his business, Outside Safe Space, which at its peak was selling stickers and pins featuring a tree with triangle-shaped, rainbow-colored branches to more than 20 associations that operated multiple park stores. His items started to be pulled from some stores after the executive orders were issued earlier this year.

"How is banning these items supporting freedom of speech?” Meyer said.

Items for sale are seen inside the Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park Visitor Center, Thursday, Dec. 11, 2025, in Kennesaw, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)

Items for sale are displayed at Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Megan Varner)

Keisha Burse looks at items for sale at Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Megan Varner)

Items for sale are on display at the museum store at Independence National Historical Park, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

Keisha Burse looks at items for sale at Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Megan Varner)

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — A grand jury declined for a second time in a week to re-indict New York Attorney General Letitia James on Thursday in another major blow to the Justice Department's efforts to prosecute the president's political opponents.

The repeated failures amounted to a stunning rebuke of prosecutors' bid to resurrect a criminal case President Donald Trump pressured them to bring, and hinted at a growing public leeriness of the administration's retribution campaign.

A grand jury rejection is an unusual circumstance in any case, but is especially stinging for a Justice Department that has been steadfast in its determination to seek revenge against Trump foes like James and former FBI Director James Comey. On separate occasions, citizens have heard the government’s evidence against James and have come away underwhelmed, unwilling to rubber-stamp what prosecutors have attempted to portray as a clear-cut criminal case.

A judge threw out the original indictments against James and Comey in November, ruling that the prosecutor who presented to the grand jury, Lindsey Halligan, was illegally appointed U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

The Justice Department asked a grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia, to return an indictment Thursday after a different grand jury in Norfolk last week refused to do so. The failure to secure an indictment was confirmed by two people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to publicly discuss the case and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

It was not immediately clear Thursday whether prosecutors would try for a third time to seek a new indictment. One of the people familiar with the matter said prosecutors were still evaluating next steps and stood behind the charges.

A lawyer for James, who has denied any wrongdoing, said the “unprecedented rejection makes even clearer that this case should never have seen the light of day.”

“This case already has been a stain on this Department’s reputation and raises troubling questions about its integrity,” defense attorney Abbe Lowell said in a statement. "Any further attempt to revive these discredited charges would be a mockery of our system of justice.”

James, a Democrat who infuriated Trump after his first term with a lawsuit alleging that he built his business empire on lies about his wealth, was initially charged with bank fraud and making false statements to a financial institution in connection with a home purchase in 2020.

During the sale, she signed a standard document called a “second home rider” in which she agreed to keep the property primarily for her “personal use and enjoyment for at least one year,” unless the lender agreed otherwise. Rather than using the home as a second residence, prosecutors say James rented it out to a family of three, allowing her to obtain favorable loan terms not available for investment properties.

Both the James and Comey cases were brought shortly after the administration installed Halligan, a former Trump lawyer with no prior prosecutorial experience, as U.S. attorney amid public calls from the president to take action against his political opponents.

But U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie threw out the cases last month over the unconventional mechanism that the Trump administration employed to appoint Halligan. The judge dismissed them without prejudice, allowing the Justice Department to try to file the charges again.

Halligan had been named as a replacement for Erik Siebert, a veteran prosecutor in the office and interim U.S. attorney who resigned in September amid Trump administration pressure to file charges against both Comey and James. He stepped aside after Trump told reporters he wanted Siebert “out.”

The White House is moving forward with the formal confirmation process for Halligan, and she recently returned her nominee questionnaire to the Senate Judiciary Committee, which vets all U.S. attorney picks. But her nomination faces significant procedural obstacles.

James’ lawyers separately argued the case was a vindictive prosecution brought to punish the Trump critic who spent years investigating and suing the Republican president and won a staggering judgment in a lawsuit alleging he defrauded banks by overstating the value of his real estate holdings on financial statements. The fine was later tossed out by a higher court, but both sides are appealing.

Comey was separately charged with lying to Congress in 2020. Another federal judge has complicated the Justice Department’s efforts to seek a new indictment against Comey, temporarily barring prosecutors from accessing computer files belonging to Daniel Richman, a close Comey friend and Columbia University law professor whom prosecutors see as a central player in any potential case against the former FBI director.

Prosecutors moved Tuesday to quash that order, calling Richman’s request for the return of his files a “strategic tool to obstruct the investigation and potential prosecution.” They said the judge had overstepped her bounds by ordering Richman’s property returned to him and said the ruling had impeded their ability to proceed with a case against Comey.

Richer reported from Washington. Associated Press reporter Eric Tucker and Seung Min Kim in Washington contributed.

FILE - New York Attorney General, Letitia James, speaks after pleading not guilty outside the United States District Court Oct. 24, 2025, in Norfolk, Va. (AP Photo/John Clark, File)