Albania is Not for Sale! Trump Family Resort Plans Face UES Protests

“I tried to visit Albania but I couldn’t find it on the map,” said Oscar Wilde; yet if he’d visited the Upper East Side in recent months, he’d have found Albanians aplenty. For the last two months, Albanian Americans living in the five boroughs have gathered outside the Albanian Consulate on East 79th Street and the United Nations building to oppose the construction of a $1.6 billion resort by President Donald Trump’s daughter, Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner, on protected lands on the Adriatic Sea.

The lands in question are Sazan Island and the Vjoza-Narta Nature Preserve. Known for their white sandy beaches, crystal blue waters, and thousands of flamingos, both Sazan Island and Vjoza-Narta are protected lands under Albania’s constitution. In addition to being nature preserves, both are home to archeological sites and former Cold War military bases.

After Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama made amendments that rolled back provisions to the Law on Protected Lands in 2024, environmentalists worry that the natural ecosystems of Sazan Island and Vjoza-Narta are on the path towards destruction, particularly if foreign investment is left unmonitored.

While Albanian media had already reported that development in this region was underway after a clandestine January 2026 meeting between Prime Minister Rama and Ivanka Trump, it was not until Ivanka Trump appeared on a podcast claiming to have “found” the island while swimming on a friend’s yacht in the Mediterranean Sea that the widespread protests begun.

The first protests were in the town of Zvernec, Albania at the end of May, which sits close to the development site. Now, thousands have been gathering every day for the past several month in Tirana, Albania’s capital boldly proclaiming that “Albania is not for sale!”

The East Side protests began on select days throughout June, with many Albanian Americans showing up to support their homeland. Some signs echoed the ones seen in Tirana, and even children showed up holding plastic flamingos. Others made comparisons to President Donald Trump’s proposed resort plans for the war-torn Gaza Strip and the planned relocation of Palestinian citizens.

Dorina Dashi was born in Albania and moved to the United States when she was four-years-old. She explained how the cost exclusivity of the proposed resort on public lands, as well as many people not knowing about the issue in New York, encouraged her to get involved in raising her voice in opposition.

“It’s an attempt for Edi Rama, the prime minister, to put even more money in his pocket,” said Dashi. “Who knows what he was offered that he is this adamant about making it happen.”

While many people walking by the consulate joined in support, even more were learning about this growing international issue for the first time.

Niku Klloboçishta moved to the United States from Albania when he was five years old yet regularly visited Vjoza-Narta region with his family when they would return to Albania for vacations. Standing at the edge of the barricade, Klloboçishta educated curious bystanders about the resort and the ongoing political situation in Albania.

“Albania’s a really small country, but to see that globally people have been protesting the land theft, it’s really motivating and inspiring,” said Klloboçishta. “I feel like this is going to be traction for what’s going to be on trend in coming years.”

But the Flamingo Revolution is about much more than just the resort construction. The official demands of the movement as listed on its website include the immediate resignation of Prime Minister Rama and the current government structure, the formation of a more transparent government in its place, free and fair elections, and to repeal the 2024 amendments to the Law on Protected Lands.

Many attendees at the protest said that while they are not inherently against foreign investment, the way in which the details of the plan have been hidden from the Albanian public for months is another entry in the government’s pattern of corruption.

Nikola Kedhi, Co-Founder of the Albanian Conservative Institute (ACI), a political think tank based in Tirana, echoed this concern. While ACI seeks to implement a free-market economy and democratic government closely resembling the United States in Albania, Kedhi spoke about the need for increased screening of foreign investments, many of which were required by the previous version of the Law on Protected Areas

“The problem is that the government hasn’t made any transparency regarding the many other protected areas,” said Kedhi. “For example, we don’t know the type of development allowed there. Is it for residential purposes? For hotels? For tourism purposes? How many floors will these constructions be? Nobody knows. How many buildings can you build there? Nobody knows.”

In addition to the lack of transparency about the development that would be happening in the Narta Region, the Flamingo Revolution has faced continual media suppression according to Albanian political experts.

Albania is also a top candidate to gain membership in the European Union, and the Flamingo Revolution protests demanded increased involvement by the EU to help protect the Narta Region. This past week, the European Parliament voted to put a moratorium on all future construction until the 2024 amendments to Albania’s Law on Protected Lands are repealed and are in full compliance with the EU’s conservation standards.

While this vote has already eliminated some of the construction trucks that were beginning to arrive on the nature preserve, protesters say that the Flamingo Revolution will not be slowing down anytime soon—not in Tirana, not in New York.

“He [Rama] knows that he is very powerful, but he forgets that we are Albanians just like him,” said Dorina Dashi. “The only difference is that we will never give up on our country the way he has.”