Just a few hours after being inaugurated as the 47th President of the United States, Donald Trump signed an executive order announcing the renaming of North America's tallest mountain peak from Denali back to Mount McKinley.
The latter name was retired in 2015 after then-President Barack Obama responded to a nearly four-decade push to restore the Native Alaskan name used for thousands of years before it was renamed after the president who served from 1897 to 1901.
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Trump orders name change for mountain peak, leaves national park alone for now
"In 1917, the country officially honored President McKinley through the naming of North America’s highest peak," reads the executive order signed late on Jan. 20.
"Yet after nearly a century, President Obama’s administration, in 2015, stripped the McKinley name from federal nomenclature, an affront to President McKinley's life, his achievements, and his sacrifice."
The land around Denali is home to Denali National Park and Preserve.
The stretch of Interior Alaska spanning more than 6.1 million acres is home to countless natural marvels such as the Wonder Lake surrounded by glaciers, ecosystems ranging from lowlands taiga to subalpine tundra as well as fauna such as caribou, moose and grizzly and black bears.
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While the order focuses solely on the 20,000-foot mountain and stipulates that "the national park area surrounding Mount McKinley shall retain the name Denali National Park and Preserve," it has drawn sharp rebukes from Alaskan lawmakers, the local Native populations as well as travelers and frequent visitors to the park.
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"I strongly disagree with the President's decision on Denali," Alaskan Senator and Chair of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee Lisa Murkowski said in a Jan. 20 statement. "Our nation's tallest mountain, which has been called Denali for thousands of years, must continue to be known by the rightful name bestowed by Alaska Koyukon Athabascans, who have stewarded the land since time immemorial."
Internet responds: 'It will be called Denali forever'
"It will be called Denali forever," Nate Luebbe, a travel photographer who won multiple awards for his work in the national park, wrote on Meta (META) 's Threads platform. "I will never say Mount McKinley under any circumstances."
Trump's executive order states that the incoming Secretary of the Interior must reinstate the name Mount McKinley on signage as well as update the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) within 30 days of Jan. 20.
"The Secretary of the Interior shall work with Alaska Native entities and state and local organizations to adopt names for landmarks to honor the history and culture of the Alaskan people," the order reads further.
Other executive orders amid the flurry signed by Trump in the first hours of his presidency include renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America and reversing Biden's order to remove Cuba from the list of countries designated as official state sponsors of terrorism.
But while the Cuba designation and renaming of Denali can be done by executive order, the body of water the United States shares with Mexico and Cuba is not subject to an international naming protocol and will continue to be called Gulf of Mexico outside the U.S.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum responded to Trump's order by saying that the United States should be renamed to "Méxicana America."
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