Douglas James Burgum ( BURG-əm; born August 1, 1956) is an American businessman and politician who has served as the 55th United States secretary of the interior since 2025 under President Donald Trump. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as the 33rd governor of North Dakota from 2016 to 2024.
Burgum was born and raised in Arthur, North Dakota. After graduating from North Dakota State University in 1978 with a bachelor's degree in university studies and earning an MBA from Stanford University two years later, he mortgaged inherited farmland in 1983 to invest in Great Plains Software in Fargo. Becoming its president in 1984, he took the company public in 1997. Burgum sold the company to Microsoft for $1.1 billion in 2001. While working at Microsoft, he managed Microsoft Business Solutions. He has served as board chairman for Australian software company Atlassian and SuccessFactors. Burgum is the founder of Kilbourne Group, a Fargo-based real-estate development firm, and also is the co-founder of Arthur Ventures, a software venture capital group.
Burgum won the 2016 North Dakota gubernatorial election in a landslide. He was reelected by a wide margin in 2020. In June 2023, Burgum launched a campaign for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. He ended his candidacy in early December 2023, and became an advisor on the Trump campaign's energy policy. On November 14, 2024, President-elect Trump announced his intention to nominate Burgum as the United States secretary of the interior. On January 30, 2025, Burgum was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in a 79–18 vote. On February 1, 2025, Burgum was sworn in as the fifty-fifth U.S. secretary of the interior.
As Secretary of the Interior, he oversaw the Trump administration's crackdown on wind power, while promoting coal-fired power, expanded drilling on federal lands, and expanded metals extraction from federal lands and wildlife refuges. In 2026, Burgum announced that U.S. taxpayers would pay multiple energy companies, including a French company, nearly $2.6 billion to stop plans to build wind farms in the United States.
Burgum was born on August 1, 1956, in Arthur, North Dakota, the son of Katherine (née Kilbourne) and Joseph Boyd Burgum, who were both of English descent. He has a brother, Bradley, and a sister, Barbara. His grandfather J. A. Burgum established a grain elevator in Arthur in 1906. The company evolved into an agribusiness still owned by the family.
During his freshman year in high school, Burgum's father died. He later said that the experience shaped him as a person. He graduated from North Dakota State University (NDSU) in 1978. He was a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon and served as student body president. As a college student, he started a chimney-sweeping business.
Burgum later studied at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he befriended Steve Ballmer, who became CEO of Microsoft. He completed his MBA from Stanford's Graduate School of Business in 1980.
After earning his MBA, Burgum moved to Chicago to become a management consultant at McKinsey & Company.
In March 1983, Burgum mortgaged $250,000 of farmland to provide the seed capital for accounting software company Great Plains Software in Fargo. He acquired a 2.5% stake in the company, and became its vice president of marketing. In 1984, Burgum led a group of investors, including relatives, who purchased a controlling interest in Great Plains Software from Joseph C. Larson, the company's founder, who retained a minority interest.
During the 1980s, Fortune magazine often ranked Great Plains Software among the nation's top 100 companies to work for. Burgum grew the company to about 250 employees by 1989 and led it to about $300 million in annual sales, after using the internet to help it expand beyond North Dakota. He said he built the company in Fargo because North Dakota State University was there; NDSU acted as a feeder school to supply engineering students to GPS. The company went public in 1997. In 1999 the company acquired Match Data Systems, a development team in the Philippines. In 2001, Burgum sold Great Plains Software to Microsoft for $1.1 billion in stock. Announced in December 2000, the acquisition was completed in 2001. According to Burgum, he held a 10% stake in Great Plains at the time.
After the sale, Burgum was named senior vice president of Microsoft Business Solutions Group, the unit created from GPS. At Microsoft, he was responsible for making enterprise apps a priority. In 2005, he expressed interest in stepping down as senior vice president to become chairman of Microsoft Business Solutions. In September 2006, he announced that he planned to leave Microsoft entirely by 2007.
In 2008 Burgum co-founded Arthur Ventures, a venture capital company that invests in businesses involved in technology, life sciences, and clean technologies. The group began operation with a $20 million fund and primarily invested in companies in North Dakota and Minnesota. By 2013 it had expanded operations into Nebraska, Missouri, Arizona, and Iowa.
Burgum is also the founder of the Kilbourne Group, a real-estate development firm focused on downtown Fargo. In 2013 he created plans to build the tallest building in Fargo—a 23-story mixed-use building—to be named either Block 9 or Dakota Place. It was completed in 2020 as the RDO Building. The company advocated for a convention center to be built in downtown Fargo. It acquired and renovated many Fargo properties, including the former St. Mark's Lutheran Church and the former Woodrow Wilson alternative high school. Several of the companies he has invested in are in Fargo.
In 2009, he was "urged to apply" for the position of president of North Dakota State University, but in 2010 he was passed over for Dean Bresciani.
Governor of North Dakota (2016–2024)
Prior to running for office, Burgum endorsed Republican Steve Sydness for one of North Dakota's U.S. Senate seats in 1988. He supported the gubernatorial campaigns of Republicans John Hoeven and Jack Dalrymple in 2008 and 2012.
In 2016, Burgum announced his candidacy for governor of North Dakota as a Republican. With no formal political experience, he lost the state Republican party's endorsement to longtime attorney general Wayne Stenehjem, but defeated Stenehjem handily in the primary election two months later. Burgum faced Democrat Marvin Nelson and Libertarian Marty Riske in the November general election and won with over 75% of the vote. He was sworn in on December 15, 2016, alongside running mate Brent Sanford.
Burgum was reelected in 2020 with over 65% of the vote.