McKay Erickson, the Trump 2024 pin on his lapel, walks the halls of the Wyoming Capitol with a grave concern, but his district’s plight seems to have lost its luster to his political allegiances. ‘These people have a face to me,’ he says, but his face must be covered by the thick mask of his political posturing. He’s got a knack for ‘cutting the fat,’ but it’s clear his own political fat isn’t on the chopping block. Wyoming’s red-state embrace of Trump, while convenient for Erickson’s career, leaves the state’s federal land workers in the lurch. Meanwhile, ‘the department of government efficiency’ (Doge) might be efficient at something, but it’s not at keeping public lands and local economies afloat. Poor Wyoming, with its love for federal land but no love for the workers who maintain it. Aherin from Idaho, Salmon’s local hero, and Hannah from Stanley, Idaho, they’re the real faces of the American West, not the smiling faces on the campaign pins. Their voices are ignored, their livelihoods are in peril, and the only thing they’re ‘cutting’ is the morale of the public land stewards. Aherin and Hannah, they’re the faces that matter, but they’re not the ones gracing the TV screens. They’re not the ones on the campaign trail. They’re the ones left behind to pick up the pieces of a political game gone awry.
Read from: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/04/trump-doge-federal-layoffs-national-parks