On March 1, hundreds of people gathered in Gardiner, Montana, at the northern entrance to Yellowstone National Park. The crowd — which included residents from across the state and current and former public lands employees — was part of a nationwide protest against the layoffs of federal workers.
Roughly 5 percent of National Park Service workers have been caught up in the sweeping layoffs carried out by Donald Trump’s administration and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency. This isn’t counting the hundreds of others who are taking the “fork in the road” offer to resign from their positions. The staffing crisis facing national parks is felt not only within the federal workforce itself but also in gateway towns like Gardiner, where the economy depends heavily on Yellowstone.
There, under the Roosevelt Arch — named for President Theodore Roosevelt, who laid its cornerstone and is known for preserving over 230 million acres of public land — protesters shouted chants like “Public lands in public hands!” and “Hey, ho, Trump and Musk have got to g... Read more
