Stand up for the facts!

Our only agenda is to publish the truth so you can be an informed participant in democracy.
We need your help.

More Info

I would like to contribute

A boat is seen on the Susitna River near Talkeetna, Alaska, June 13, 2021, with Mount McKinley in the background. (AP) A boat is seen on the Susitna River near Talkeetna, Alaska, June 13, 2021, with Mount McKinley in the background. (AP)

A boat is seen on the Susitna River near Talkeetna, Alaska, June 13, 2021, with Mount McKinley in the background. (AP)

Kwasi Gyamfi Asiedu
By Kwasi Gyamfi Asiedu January 23, 2025

US’ highest mountain called Denali for thousands of years, and Mount McKinley for nearly a century

If Your Time is short

  • Native Alaskan language scholars say the name Denali had been used by Indigenous people for thousands of years for the tallest mountain in North America, found in Alaska.

  • The mountain’s name officially changed in 1917 to honor President William McKinley. In 2015, the Obama administration changed the mountain’s official name to Denali.

  • President Donald Trump on Jan. 20 ordered changing the mountain’s name back to Mount McKinley.

President William McKinley may never have set foot in Alaska but one of President Donald Trump’s first executive actions upon reentering the White House was to reestablish its most famous mountain — North America’s tallest — as McKinley’s namesake.

The mountain was called Mount McKinley from 1917 to 2015, when the Obama administration renamed it Denali.

The Obama-era change followed decades of requests from Native Alaskan leaders for the mountain’s native name ‘Denali,’ a Koyukon Athabaskan word meaning "the tall one," "the high one" or "the great one" to be restored.

In his Jan. 20 order, Trump called the name change to Denali an "affront to President McKinley’s life, his achievements, and his sacrifice." The national park where the mountain is found will continue to be called Denali National Park and Preserve, Trump’s order said.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, for years has argued to keep the name Denali and criticized Trump’s move.

Sign up for PolitiFact texts

"I strongly disagree with the President’s decision on Denali," Murkowski said in a Jan. 20 X post. "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’s Koyukon Athabascans, who have stewarded the land since time immemorial."

Is Murkowski right that the mountain has been called Denali for "thousands of years"? PolitiFact asked four Native Alaskan language and cultural experts and a former cartographer involved in the 2015 name change to weigh in.

"It is not just thousands of years, but over 10,000 years," said James Kari, a linguist and an emeritus professor at the Native Alaskan Language Center who has specialized in the Dené or Athabaskan language family for 50 years. Native Alaskan place names have been in use for more than 13,000 years, Kari said.

There is little written evidence of place names related to Native Alaskan tribes because they primarily have an oral tradition. But experts agree the name "Denali" has been passed down over several generations.

"We have this overlap of history and archaeology and geology that align with validating the longevity of Dené place names," said Taa’ąįį Ch’igiiontà, the Gwich'in language director of the Neetsaii Gwich'in tribe, citing other Native Alaskan place names that have endured for centuries. The Gwich'in language is part of the Athabascan language family. "So, I think it's quite accurate for Murkowski to say that the name is thousands of years old."

A 2016 National Park Service article said, "‘McKinley’ was incompatible with the Athabascan worldview because they rarely name places after people."

We asked Murkowski’s office for further information but received no reply. Trump’s order said the interior secretary shall reinstate the name Mount McKinley; the Senate has yet to confirm Trump’s interior secretary nominee, former North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum.

Disputes over the mountain’s name are not new

In 1975, Alaska’s Legislature passed a resolution requesting the mountain’s name to revert to Denali and Gov. Jay Hammond petitioned the federal government with this request. But the Ohio congressional delegation (where McKinley had been governor) blocked attempts to change the name.

Featured Fact-check

After McKinley’s assassination in 1901, "there was just an outcry of grief, of course, (and) that they thought: ‘We need to remember this man, let's rename that mountain in Alaska, make it McKinley’ and it stayed that way," said Douglas L. Vandegraft, the Domestic Names Committee’s former chairman and retired cartographer for the Interior Department. 

Despite that, Native Alaskans continued to refer to the mountain as Denali. 

For Indigenous people, the government’s use of native names for places is important after centuries of colonization that sought to erase native culture and identity.

"It feels to some people like a small thing, but for Indigenous people, it's really important because it's a matter of recognizing that we are here, that we were stewards of these lands in many cases for millennia," Forest S. Haven, assistant professor of anthropology and Alaska Native Studies at the University of Alaska Southeast, said. "Returning these place names points to that. It brings indigenous people into the present and puts us on the land in a way that we historically always were."

Our ruling

Murkowski said, "Our nation’s tallest mountain … has been called Denali for thousands of years." 

Four Native Alaskan scholars and a retired Interior Department official who researched the history of the name agree that Denali was the name of the mountain for thousands of years.

But for nearly a century, from 1917 to 2015, the mountain was officially called Mount McKinley.

Murkowski’s statement is accurate but needs additional information. We rate it Mostly True.

Our Sources

National Park Service, Denali or Mount McKinley?, accessed Jan. 21, 2025

The White House, Restoring Names That Honor American Greatness, Jan. 20, 2025

PBS, Alaska-bound, Obama makes waves by renaming Mount McKinley, Aug. 30, 2015

X post, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Jan. 20, 2025

Department of Interior, Change of the Name of Mount McKinley to Denali, Aug. 28, 2015

PolitiFact, Trump unable to bring (Mount) McKinley back to life, Dec. 10, 2018 

Email interview with X̱'unei Lance Twitchell, professor of Alaska Native Languages, University of Alaska Southeast, Jan. 22, 2025

Phone interview with Forest S. Haven, assistant professor of anthropology and Alaska Native Studies at the University of Alaska, Southeast, Jan. 21, 2025

Phone interview with Douglas L. Wandegraft, former chairman of the Domestic Names Committee and retired cartographer, Jan. 21, 2025

Phone interview with James Kari, Professor Emeritus, Alaska Native Languages, Jan. 21, 2025

Phone interview with Taa’ąįį Ch’igiiontà’, Gwich'in language director of the Neetsaii Gwich'in tribe, Jan. 21, 2025

Library of Congress, The ascent of Denali (Mount McKinley) a narrative of the first complete ascent of the highest peak in North America, accessed Jan. 22, 2025

U.S. Senate, Senator Murkowski Opposes Denali Name Change, Dec. 23, 2024

Alaska Historical Society, President Harding’s Voyage of Understanding, June 1923, June 23, 2013

The American Presidency Project, Fact Sheet: President Obama to Announce New Steps to Enhance Administration Collaboration with Alaska Natives, the State of Alaska, and Local Communities, Aug. 30, 2015

The White House Historical Association, Presidential Vacations & Retreats: President Harding in Alaska, accessed Jan. 23, 2025

Congress, S.155 - A bill to designate a mountain in the State of Alaska as Denali, accessed Jan. 22, 2025

NBC News, Behind the 'Historical Accident' That Led to Mt. McKinley's Renaming, Aug. 31, 2015

The Associated Press, Trump order seeks to change the name of North America’s tallest peak from Denali to Mount McKinley, Jan. 20, 2025

Browse the Truth-O-Meter

More by Kwasi Gyamfi Asiedu

US’ highest mountain called Denali for thousands of years, and Mount McKinley for nearly a century

Support independent fact-checking.
Become a member!

In a world of wild talk and fake news, help us stand up for the facts.

Sign me up