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Google will rename the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska’s Denali mountain in Google Maps once a federal mapping database reflects changes ordered by the Trump Administration, the company announced Monday.
Google is complying with an executive order issued last week by President Donald Trump that changed the names of several American landmarks. The executive order was followed up by a statement from the U.S. Department of the Interior, which said the name changes were now official and America’s geographic naming bodies were working “expeditiously” to fulfill Trump’s order.
“We have a longstanding practice of applying name changes when they have been updated in official government sources,” Google wrote in a post on X.
We’ve received a few questions about naming within Google Maps. We have a longstanding practice of applying name changes when they have been updated in official government sources.
— News from Google (@NewsFromGoogle) January 27, 2025The Gulf of Mexico’s name in Google Maps will soon be the “Gulf of America” for U.S. users, an entirely new name created by the Trump administration.
Denali, which is North America’s highest peak, will soon show up in Google Maps for all global users as its previous name of Mount McKinley. The Alaskan mountain was named Mount McKinley in 1917 to honor America’s 25th president, William McKinley; the peak was renamed Denali during the Obama administration in 2015. The Trump administration is changing it back, despite protests from some Alaskan senators.
However, not everyone in the world using Google Maps will see the Gulf of America.
Geographic names that are contested between different countries show up in Google Maps under each country’s official name for their citizens, according to a social media post from Google. That means the Gulf of Mexico’s name will not change for Mexican users of Google Maps, where the country’s president, Claudia Shienbaum, mocked Trump for suggesting a new name for the body of water. In other countries, Google Maps will display both America and Mexico’s names for the gulf side by side.
Google says it will make these changes when the official American naming database, the Geographic Names Information System or GNIS, is updated. Though the Interior Department announced the Gulf of America and Mount McKinley’s name changes were official on Friday, GNIS still reflects that both are named the Gulf of Mexico and Denali as of Monday evening.
Maxwell Zeff is a senior reporter at TechCrunch specializing in AI and emerging technologies. Previously with Gizmodo, Bloomberg, and MSNBC, Zeff has covered the rise of AI and the Silicon Valley Bank crisis. He is based in San Francisco. When not reporting, he can be found hiking, biking, and exploring the Bay Area’s food scene.
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