The Trump administration’s seizure of three public golf courses in Washington, D.C., should be a local story in the nation’s capital. However, because of the way the seizure is taking place, and given President Donald Trump’s outsized presence in the game, it is a story with reverberations throughout the global golf ecosystem.
On Dec. 30, Trump, through the office of the U.S. Department of the Interior, informed the National Links Trust that its 50-year lease to operate the three daily-fee golf courses in the District of Columbia had been terminated. In a letter to the non-profit NLT, the Interior Department said the decision was based on what it described as NLT’s failure to complete required capital improvements and to provide a satisfactory plan to cure alleged defaults under the lease.
“The National Links Trust is devastated by the Trump administration’s decision to terminate our 50-year lease with the National Park Service,” a statement posted at the NLT website said. “Since taking over stewardship of the Rock Creek, East Potomac and Langston courses five years ago, NLT has consistently complied with all lease obligations as we work to ensure the brightest possible future for public golf in D.C.
“We are fundamentally in disagreement with the administration’s characterization of NLT as being in default under the lease. We have always had a productive and cooperative working relationship with the National Park Service and have worked hand in hand on all aspects of our golf course operations and development projects.”
Reaction from the American golf community was swift and condemnatory. That response is best captured by a post on the Donald Ross Society President account on X: “National Links Trust assemblage of a global class team to deliver an ‘excellent public golf’ mission is unparalleled and should be actively supported and championed by every golfer. NLT’s ‘golf for the people’ mission is worthy of praise, replication, and defense.”
The three D.C. golf courses all sit on federal land, each occupying sections of three different national parks. During the first Trump administration, the Department of the Interior and the National Park Service concluded that the existing management structure of the facilities made it impossible to make significant, meaningful improvements to the crumbling infrastructure.
The National Links Trust was formed to tackle this challenge. It registered as a 501(c)(3) non-profit with the idea that the substantial amounts of capital required to make these upgrades would be raised philanthropically, thereby sparing users the cost of the improvements in the form of higher green fees. Affordability and accessibility are at the core of NLT values.