The U.S. Department of the Interior is pushing back against reports that the Trump administration is quietly preparing to give a private developer access to a piece of Yosemite National Park.
The agency called the account "not true."
The department's denial follows reports that the National Park Service had been examining a possible land exchange or easement involving Kingsbarn Realty Capital, a Nevada investment company that owns roughly 83 acres outside Yosemite's western boundary.
Kingsbarn has sought a short road connecting its property to Highway 120, according to the news site NOTUS, which first reported the possible easement exchange on Friday. Such a route would provide more direct access to Yosemite for any home, hotel or resort developments on the private land.
"This story relies on anonymous allegations to manufacture a political narrative that simply is not true," an Interior Department spokesperson wrote Monday in an email to YourCentralValley.com. "There has been no political pressure to reach a predetermined outcome."
The department also said that claims it was "secretly working to hand over National Park Service land to a private developer are false."
The statement disputes the characterization of the reported effort, but it does not say that no proposal has been discussed. The department said no final decisions have been made and that any land exchange or access proposal would have to comply with federal law, environmental review requirements and public-notification rules.
"If a proposal were to advance, the Department will follow established procedures to ensure appropriate coordination, transparency and public involvement consistent with federal law," officials said.
The NOTUS report cited four people familiar with the discussions and agency documents. The Chronicle separately reported that two officials familiar with the conversations confirmed discussions of a possible arrangement and that a federal memo provided to Congress referred to a possible land conveyance at Yosemite for commercial development.
The reported arrangement would involve exchanging a roughly quarter-mile strip of National Park Service land - or an interest in that land - for property of equal value elsewhere in California. The federal government would need to appraise the Yosemite property and identify replacement land before any exchange could occur.
Kingsbarn attorney Lanny Davis has confirmed that the company is pursuing access to its property through a possible land exchange.
"It wasn't Donald Trump; it was me, liberal Democrat Lanny Davis, former counsel to President Clinton, (who) went to the Department of Interior, and we made the argument that this is a pro-environmental decision to allow this road to be directly built to allow the residents of this privately owned property to gain entrance or exit to the park," Davis told NOTUS.
The Kingsbarn property, previously known as Hazel Green Ranch, was purchased through a company linked to the developer in 2024 for $4 million. Its previous owner, California developer Lewis Geyser, spent years seeking permission to build a road through Yosemite, but lost a related legal fight in federal court.
The Interior Department's response came as elected officials and conservation advocates criticized the reported land exchange.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta said his office was monitoring the situation.
"Our national parks belong to the people," Bonta wrote. "They're not the property of any one administration."
California lawmakers, including Rep. Jared Huffman and Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff, have also expressed opposition to the proposed access route.
"These places should be protected for every generation, not sold off to Trump's ultra-wealthy friends to profit off of," Huffman wrote.
The National Parks Conservation Association called the reported plan unlawful and said a federal court had previously rejected a road proposal involving the property.
No public application for a Yosemite land exchange has been identified, and the National Park Service has not announced a formal environmental review or public-comment process for the reported proposal.
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This article originally published at Trump administration denies secret Yosemite land trade, says claims are 'simply not true'.