KEYSTONE, S.D. — As statues of famous Americans, some with connections to racism are being taken down by state or local governments or by protestors’ force, George, Abe, Teddy and Tom are staying put.
Conservative radio and podcast host Ben Shapiro posed the question when will Mount Rushmore be taken down.
But Republican South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem responded, not on her watch.
Two of the presidents depicted on the monument, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, owned slaves. Statues of them have been torn down in other areas of the country, The Argus Leader in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, reported.
The carved monument also depicts the faces of presidents Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt.
The monument itself, which is maintained by the Department of the Interior, is not without its own controversy. The Black Hills area was given to Native American tribes in 1868 as part of the Fort Laramie Treaty, but the Indian Appropriations Act of 1876 gave the area back to the federal government, according to the newspaper. Tribes have been trying to take back the land the monument sits upon.