According to Reuters, on December 22, US President-elect Donald Trump announced that he would rename Denali mountain to McKinley, after the 25th US President, William McKinley.
In 1917, the US government recognized McKinley as the official name of the mountain, but the name had been in use long before that.
The name McKinley began to be used and became popular in 1897, when a miner in the area learned that William McKinley was a supporter of the gold standard and had won the Republican nomination for president.
However, former President Barack Obama renamed the mountain Denali in 2015, ending the debate over the name of the “roof” of North America when he sided with the people of Alaska.
Mr. Obama said that the late President William McKinley never visited the mountain and also “did not have any significant historical connection to the mountain or the people of Alaska.”
Denali, which means “Great One” in the local Athabascan language, was officially recognized as the mountain’s name by the state of Alaska in 1975. Alaskans and officials then fought for decades to get the federal government to accept the name.
Denali (formerly McKinley) is approximately 6,000m high and is located in Denali National Park and Preserve in Alaska.
Speaking to voters in Phoenix, Arizona (USA) on December 22, President-elect Donald Trump pledged to bring back the name McKinley to the mountain when he takes over the White House, because he believes that the late President William McKinley was a great leader and completely deserves this.
Before becoming President in 1897, William McKinley served two terms as Governor of Ohio. According to the White House, McKinley was instrumental in resolving the Spanish-American conflict in 1898 and in raising tariffs to protect American industry.
Despite being a Republican, Alaska congresswoman Lisa Murkowski disagreed with his opinion. “There is only one name worthy of the tallest mountain in North America: Denali – The Great One,” Ms. Murkowski wrote on social network X.
