Trump's dream? Join immortals on Mount Rushmore, lawmaker says

U.S. presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln are sculpted on Mount Rushmore National Memorial in the Black Hills region of South Dakota. (Reuters)

“Make America Great Again” is the goal of Donald Trump’s presidency. But Trump’s personal dream is to have his likeness added to Mount Rushmore.

So says U.S. Rep. Kristi Noem, R-S.D.

How does Noem know? The congresswoman claims Trump shared the dream with her when she visited the Oval Office.

Noem told the story to Mitchell Olson, the South Dakotan who appeared on TV’s “Survivor.” They were filming a video patterned after late-night host James Corden’s “carpool karaoke” segments, according to the Argus Leader of Sioux Falls, S.D.

“[Trump] said, ‘Kristi, come on over here. Shake my hand,’” Noem said, according to the newspaper.

“I shook his hand, and I said, ‘Mr. President, you should come to South Dakota sometime. We have Mount Rushmore.'

U.S. Rep. Kristi Noem, R-S.D.

“And he goes, 'Do you know it's my dream to have my face on Mount Rushmore?'"

Noem thought the president was joking, the paper reported.

“I started laughing,” she said. “He wasn't laughing, so he was totally serious.”

No one from the White House responded when the Argus Leader checked to verify the story. But the newspaper noted that Trump did mention Mount Rushmore during a rally in Youngstown, Ohio, last July.

“I'd ask whether or not you think I will someday be on Mount Rushmore, but here's the problem: If I did it joking, totally joking, having fun, the fake news media will say 'he believes he should be on Mount Rushmore,’” the newspaper quotes Trump as having said.

“So I won't say it, OK? I won't say it.”

Click here for more from the Argus Leader.