This Land Was Your Land
How the National Parks Are Being Erased & Who’s Fighting Back
As wildflowers bloom and families plan summer trips to America’s most cherished landscapes, something far more sinister is unfolding behind the trail maps and ranger stations.
Since February, the Department of Government Efficiency has slashed over 1,000 full-time National Park Service jobs, rescinded thousands more seasonal hires, and quietly frozen critical funding for park maintenance, staffing, and education. Trails are going unmended. Visitor centers sit dark. And communities that once relied on their local park staff for school programs, cultural history nights, and fire prevention are finding silence where stewardship once lived.
This is happening as the U.S. approaches its 250th anniversary, a moment meant for national reflection and pride. Instead, it’s becoming a story of erasure: of science, memory, public access, and the quiet, devoted workers who hold the country’s most democratic spaces together.
The question isn’t just what we’re losing.
It’s why now, and who benefits.
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A System Cut at the Knees
The layoffs came early in 2025, well before the usual wave of seasonal hiring. These weren’t temp workers. These full-time professionals work year-round on fire planning, trail maintenance, endangered species monitoring, and community education.
As visitors return in record numbers, the parks are critically understaffed, underprepared for fire season, overburdened with backlogs, and hollowed out of institutional knowledge.
Not Just Trees: Every Landscape Has Its Fire
National parks are more than forests. The National Park Service oversees 429 unique sites — deserts, coral reefs, battlefields, wetlands, and seashores — each with its own version of wildfire.
In the desert Southwest, invasive grasses fuel firestorms across ecosystems once thought too arid to burn. Hurricanes and rising seas wash out boardwalks and flood coastal visitor centers. And in battlefield parks, extreme weather threatens artifacts and fragile historic buildings.
These threats don’t manage themselves. They require people—trained, experienced, and present—and DOGE has fired exactly those people.
Invasive Species: The Silent Siege
The loss of park ecologists, aquatic specialists, and resource staff has allowed invasive species to spread with far less resistance. Once the USDA and state agencies can’t contain them, the NPS becomes the last line of defense.
Quagga mussels threaten aquatic ecosystems and infrastructure at Lake Mead. Spotted lanternflies creep closer to protected lands in the East. Tegu lizards multiply across fragile habitats in South Florida.
Without early detection and active containment, these threats can do decades of damage before they’re even noticed.
Record-Breaking Popularity, Record-Breaking Neglect
In 2024, the National Park Service reported 331.9 million recreation visits, the highest number in its history. That’s 6.36 million more than 2023, and more than the previous record set in 2016.
At the same time, over 1,000 staff were fired, 2,000+ seasonal hires were rescinded, and budgets were slashed across the board.
More people are visiting the parks than ever before, and fewer people are being paid to protect them.
One of the Few That Pays for Itself & Then Some
The National Park Service is one of the rare federal agencies that generates more than it costs. In 2023, the NPS:
Supported 415,000 jobs
Generated $26.4 billion in visitor spending
Contributed $55.6 billion to the U.S. economy
For every $1 spent, the return is more than $10.
And yet, DOGE’s actions have shuttered visitor centers, paused infrastructure projects, and stripped communities of their educational and ecological outreach partners.
In any rational government, this agency would be a crown jewel. Under DOGE, it’s a target.
Why They’re Being Targeted
This isn’t about efficiency. It's about removing institutions that preserve memory, science, and stewardship.
Park rangers explain climate change and document species loss. Educators partner with schools and Indigenous communities to share histories others might ignore. Cultural interpreters protect fragile artifacts and oral traditions that tether us to place and people.
These roles don’t serve the market; they serve the public, which makes them dangerous in this administration.
As Alt National Parks wrote after reviewing DOGE’s public claims: “Nothing they have identified constitutes fraud, waste, or abuse. They have no proof — and they never will.”
DOGE didn’t just cut jobs. It tried to cut the mission itself, the long game of preservation, equity, and truth.
The Pushback: Rangers, Rogue Accounts, and Roadside Resistance
But the land remembers. And so do its stewards.
Alt National Parks, the rogue resistance account born in 2017, has returned with real-time updates, whistleblower tips, and internal documentation of DOGE’s damage. They’re tracking the dismantling as it happens.
Alt National Parks put it plainly in a recent post: “Getting creative! Hundreds of billboards are rising in 40 U.S. cities, bashing staff and service cuts at national parks under DOGE.”
This is in reference to advocacy group More Perfect Union, which has launched 300 billboards across 40 cities, bearing bold messages like “Park Rangers Fired. Made Possible by D.O.G.E.”
“Some elected officials and unelected billionaires would rather privatize or eliminate our public services,” said Faiz Shakir of More Perfect Union. “We believe strongly in the need for great public parks and outdoor spaces that all Americans can enjoy.”
From whistleblowers to billboards, the message is clear: this isn’t just about land. It’s about who decides what America remembers, and what it forgets.
The Unlikeliest Resistance
No one expected the resistance to wear ranger hats and cardigans. But here they are.
Park educators, librarians, and public historians — the people who connect local communities to history, nature, and civic memory — are quietly organizing. They’re not loud. But they’re stubborn. And they’re still here.
They can defund the position. But they can’t erase the mission.
When a climber scaled El Capitan to hang an upside-down U.S. flag in protest of DOGE, it was a message. Not just of crisis, but of stewardship. The systems we thought were permanent are fragile. And the ones defending them aren’t CEOs; they’re public servants with fleece, field guides, and fire in their hearts.
What You Can Do
You don’t need a ranger badge or a billboard to stand up for our parks:
Visit your parks, especially the lesser-known ones. Show up. Speak up.
Write your representatives & demand restoration of staffing and funding.
Support watchdog orgs like Alt NPS, NPCA, or local “Friends of” groups.
Follow @AltNatParkSer; they’re tracking threats and sounding the alarm.
Spend the 250th anniversary not at a parade, but in the parks that tell the truth of who we are.
They thought the parks would go quiet.
But the land remembers, and so do we.
We just hit 13,000 subscribers—thank you! We’re offering full access to The Coffman Chronicle at 50% off to celebrate.
Get exclusive analysis and fearless reporting you won’t find in corporate media.
Bibliography:
National Park Service. “Visitor Use Data - Social Science.” Last updated March 2025.
National Parks Traveler. “Advocacy Group Erecting 300 Billboards Across Country In Support Of National Parks.” May 4, 2025.
Axios Philadelphia. “Billboards Popping Up Across Philly Slam National Park Cuts.” May 5, 2025.
The Guardian. “As Musk Steps Back, Experts Say DOGE Cuts Have Harmed Government Services.” May 5, 2025.
The Guardian. “'A Ruthless Agenda': Charting 100 Days of Trump's Onslaught on the Environment.” May 1, 2025.
AP News. “What Trump's Budget Cuts Could Mean for the Environment.” May 2, 2025.
Politico. “DOGE Has Made a Big Impact on Washington. But Government Spending Is Up.” April 29, 2025.
The New Yorker. “How Donald Trump Is Expanding His Authority While Shrinking the Government.” May 3, 2025.
National Parks Traveler. “National Park Service Quiet About Record 2024 Visitation.” March 6, 2025.
SFGate. “'All-Out Assault': Trump Proposes Largest Cuts in National Park Service History.” May 3, 2025.
NBC Miami. “300 Billboards Go Up Across US to Protest DOGE's Cuts at National Parks.” May 6, 2025.
ExplorersWeb. “Yosemite Climbers Hang U.S. Flag Upside-Down on El Capitan in Protest.” February 23, 2025.
CBS News. “Upside-Down U.S. Flag Hung at Yosemite National Park in Protest of Employee Cuts.” February 24, 2025.
Alt National Park Service. “Getting creative! Hundreds of billboards are rising in 40 U.S. cities, bashing staff and service cuts at national parks under DOGE.” BlueSky, May 5, 2025.
Alt National Park Service. “Nothing they have identified constitutes fraud, waste, or abuse. They have no proof — and they never will.” Facebook, May 2025.
Florida Politics. “Billboards rise in South Florida slamming DOGE cuts to parks,” quoting Faiz Shakir of More Perfect Union. May 5, 2025.
The best times of my life were spent in our national parks. Seeing the upside down flag on, I’m assuming, Yosemite granite made me cry.
My family spends a lot of time in our parks. This is more than disappointing to say the least.