President Donald Trump, along with some of his aides and supporters, have proposed a number of absurd ideas to aggrandize him. By far the most absurd is their repeated appeals to add his likeness to Mount Rushmore.

Carved into South Dakota’s Black Hills between 1927 and 1941, Rushmore features four of America’s most celebrated presidents: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln. None of them ever asked to be memorialized, and sculptor Gutzon Borglum began carving the monument after all four had died.

Trump, though, delights in breaking presidential norms. And so he has repeatedly pushed the idea of becoming the fifth Rushmore figure, all while saying he’s not serious about it.

Trump certainly sounded serious in his Independence Day celebration at Mount Rushmore earlier this month, on the eve of the 250th anniversary of American independence. Before the speech, Trump posted a large video depicting a gilded Mount Rushmore with his face chiseled into it next to Lincoln. In the video, he said, “I will be the greatest president for many, many years to come.”

White House spokesman Taylor Rogers told ABC News, “There would be no better addition to the iconic Mount Rushmore than the 45th and 47th president of the United States, Donald Trump.”

As Trump traveled to the event on Air Force One, aides handed out cookies showing his face etched in the mountain next to Lincoln.

Dan Wenk, former National Park Service superintendent at Mount Rushmore, ridiculed the notion of adding Trump.

“Would you add another figure to da Vinci’s 'The Last Supper'?” he asked. “I don’t think so. You don’t change great art.” He said the rock is too fractured and too soft to accommodate another carving.

Trump would have to raise his historical standing — hugely, as he would say — to even have a shot at Rushmore immortality. Since Trump became president in January 2017, there have been at least six surveys of prominent American historians ranking the country’s presidents. The first one, in 2017, didn’t include him because he was new to the White House. In the five subsequent surveys, Trump has not ranked higher than 41st. In the most recent one, he ranked dead last.

The four Rushmore figures, by contrast, all ranked in the top seven. One result would surely infuriate Trump: President Barack Obama, whom he succeeded in his first term, came in seventh in the most recent survey, conducted last year by the American Political Science Association, which represents political-science professors and other scholars.

In April, feverish rumors spread online that Trump would be added to Rushmore. They were quickly traced to a gag article by London’s Daily Mail, which updated its story with the humorous retraction: “April Fool! Don’t rush to protest against Trump’s move, we’re only joking. Did YOU fall for it?” The article featured an AI-generated image of sculptors drilling Trump’s bust into the mountain, next to Lincoln.

During an Oval Office meeting in 2018 with South Dakota Rep. Kristi Noem during her successful gubernatorial campaign, Trump told her, “Do you know it’s my dream to have my face on Mount Rushmore?” Recounting the meeting afterward, Noem said, “He wasn’t laughing, he was totally serious.”

Trump, in typical fashion, issued a non-denial denial. Labeling it “fake news," he said he’d “never suggested it” — but couldn’t stop himself from adding it “sounds like a good idea to me!”

Since then, despite repeating his desire in campaign rallies and social media posts, Trump has claimed he’s kidding, and berated mainstream media for taking him seriously.

Seven years later, with Trump starting his second term, Florida Rep. Anna Paulina Luna introduced a bill “to arrange for the carving” of Trump on Mount Rushmore. It was referred to the Committee on Natural Resources but has received no hearing, much less a vote, although the House panel is controlled by Republicans.

Even without Trump’s likeness, Rushmore is opposed to this day by tribal nations that say the monument had defiled sacred land. They have refused reparations from the federal government. An 1868 treaty deeded the Black Hills to the Lakota tribe, but gold prospectors forced them from the land. The Supreme Court ruled in 1980 that the government had seized the land illegally, though it remains under the control of the National Park Service. The service issued a June 27 statement that “there are no viable locations left for additional carvings.”

The idea dates to at least 2015 during Trump’s first presidential campaign. A cartoon in the Tulsa World showed him at Mount Rushmore, admiring his likeness carved next to Lincoln.

Trump has also proposed building a “triumphal arch” reaching 250 feet at the base of the Arlington National Cemetery, drawing opposition from veterans’ groups. Another Trump idea is a “National Garden of Heroes” featuring 250 sculptures of prominent Americans, to be built along the Potomac River just below the National Mall. Three executive orders spanning his two terms name a broad range of famous figures, from Washington, Lincoln and Jefferson to Martin Luther King Jr., Muhammad Ali and Frank Sinatra.

South Dakota Republican Gov. Larry Rhoden is lobbying for the National Garden to be built near Mount Rushmore, and a local mining company has offered to donate 40 acres for it. The House allocated $40 million for the garden, but the Senate has not acted.

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ABOUT THE WRITER

James Rosen is a former political reporter and Pentagon correspondent for McClatchy who has received awards from the National Press Club, Military Reporters and Editors, and the Society of Professional Journalists, which in 2021 named him top opinion columnist. He wrote this for InsideSources.com.

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