Bay Area author says Yosemite is quietly banning his water book

Bay Area naturalist and illustrator Obi Kaufmann says his acclaimed environmental book The State of Water: Understanding California’s Most Precious Resource is being quietly phased out of Yosemite National Park gift shops under a new federal directive targeting so-called “anti-American” materials. According to a recent Facebook post, Kaufmann was told that Yosemite bookstores will stop ordering new copies of the 2019 title, effectively banning it once existing stock sells through.

Environmental book caught in new federal crackdown

Kaufmann says his book was flagged under former President Donald Trump’s 2025 executive order, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” which instructs federal sites to remove content that “inappropriately disparage[s] Americans past or living.” The directive, issued in March 2025, has triggered a sweeping review of displays and bookstore inventories across national parks nationwide, including Yosemite’s Village Store and other outlets. The Washington Post reports that gift shops have been told to report products deemed “anti-American” or overly negative.

The State of Water, published by California indie house Heyday Books, traces the history and politics behind California’s water crisis, warning against further exploitation of already strained rivers and ecosystems. Science director Jonathan Rosenfield of San Francisco Baykeeper told SFGATE that the book’s focus on ecological decline and resource abuse may be exactly what the administration is “scared of.”

The National Park Service did not respond to SFGATE’s questions about whether Yosemite bookstores have, in fact, flagged or restricted the title. Kaufmann says he learned of the move through confidential sources and describes the process as a “clandestine attempt to exert non-democratic power and to control the narrative.” He also noted the “whiplash irony” that he was selected as the Yosemite Keynote Artist by the National Gallery of Art this year, even as his book is reportedly being pushed off park shelves.

Backlash, ‘Streisand Effect,’ and a bigger fight over park books

The Yosemite decision sits within a broader national battle over what visitors are allowed to read in public lands bookstores. Park advocacy groups warn that the 2025 order risks sanitizing both environmental history and accounts of injustice on federal lands, echoing a pattern familiar to readers following recent National Park Service policy debates and wider book ban campaigns across the country. In May, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum ordered all park units to post signs inviting visitors to report materials that fail to emphasize “beauty, grandeur, and abundance.”

Kaufmann says The State of Water is not alone: he claims at least three other Yosemite titles have been flagged, though he has not named them publicly. Meanwhile, his wider body of work is drawing fresh attention. Readers online report buying his books in solidarity, including his bestselling The California Field Atlas, producing a classic “Streisand Effect” in which an attempted ban fuels more sales and visibility.

Wildlife advocate Beth Pratt, author of Yosemite Wildlife: The Wonder of Animal Life in California’s Sierra Nevada, called any restriction on Kaufmann’s work “shameful,” telling SFGATE that censoring science-driven environmental writing “hurts us all.” For book lovers and nature readers, Yosemite’s quiet culling underscores how federal policy now shapes which environmental nonfiction titles appear on park shelves—and which stories about land, water, and history visitors are allowed to take home.