Tens of thousands of federal employees have been abruptly fired in the past few weeks.
The nationwide purge is part of the Trump administration's plan to pare down federal spending by making dramatic cuts to the workforce.
So far, probationary workers have been the first to go.
That's anyone who's been in their position for less than a year.
Over a dozen federal agencies have been affected, including FEMA, the IRS, and the Department of Energy.
Among the hardest hit have been public land managers, with thousands of employees fired from the National Park Service and the United States Forest Service since mid-February.
For Rocky Mountain Community Radio, KZMU's Emily Arntsen reports on how this is playing out in southeast Utah.
The conversation below has been edited for clarity and length.
Emily Arntsen: In Moab, 12 people have been cut from the Forest Service.
The district's entire trail crew was eliminated, including one employee who asked to remain semi-anonymous in case there's a chance for him to be reinstated.
Can you introduce yourself as you would prefer to be known?
Chris: My name is Chris, and I've been with the Forest Service off and on since I was 21 years old.
Arntsen: He's worked seasonal jobs with the Forest Service for 11 years until this past June when he got a permanent position with the trail crew in Moab.
But despite over a decade of employment with the agency, he hadn't yet hit his one year mark in his new position.
And like many other probationary workers, he was fired without a clear explanation why.
Chris: We have been illegally terminated, not just myself, but from what I've heard up to 3500 Forest Service employees have been terminated without just cause.
Arntsen: Can you elaborate on what makes it an illegal termination?
Chris: Last year, the Biden administration created all of these permanent positions designating a whole bunch of new Forest Service employees, federal employees. And it seems like this new administration has overstepped their boundaries, giving no just cause other than poor performance without doing an appropriate evaluation of every employee.
Arntsen: Last week, a federal judge ruled that the mass firings are likely illegal after a group of labor unions sued the administration.
The plaintiffs claim that the agency who ordered the terminations, the Office of Personnel Management, doesn't have the authority to fire employees outside of its department.
Chris: We lost a few people in hydrology, we lost people in botany, we lost our entire trail crew, people who had been working here for years, longer than I had been working here, but they had been seasonals.
Arntsen: I was going to ask you about your termination email. Is that something that you would be able to like to read for me or share?
Chris: This is to provide notification that the agency is removing you from your position of forestry technician and federal service consistent with the above references. Your appointment is subject to a probationary trial period. Until the probationary period has been completed The probationer has the burden to demonstrate why it is in the public interest for the government to finalize an appointment to the civil service for this particular individual.
The agency finds based on your performance that you have not demonstrated that your further employment at the agency would be in the public interest. For this reason, the agency informs you that the Agency is removing you from your position of forestry technician with the agency and the Federal Civil Service effective immediately. We appreciate your service to the agency and wish you the greatest of the success in your future endeavors. If you have any offboarding questions, please contact your supervisor or human resources management contact center from Deirdre Fogel, director of Human Resource Management.
Arntsen: Did you talk to your supervisor and did they have any information for you?
Chris: They didn't know what was going on.
Arntsen: I guess I was surprised that it was something to do with your performance. I mean, did your supervisor say anything about that?
Chris: Yeah, if you were to ask my supervisor, he could give you my performance reviews, and they're all outstanding. The crew received an outstanding review for what they're doing out here.
Arntsen: Did you or any of your coworkers were let go to file an appeal?
Chris: I believe all of us did this feels like something crazy where this administration is coming up with an excuse to fire everybody to save the maximum amount of money and eventually they might reinstate us but if we get our jobs back it's like how do you forgive the current administration for this it's insane.
Arntsen: Can you explain what your position was on the trail crew and what you were doing?
Chris: We clear the trails, we make sure that they're maintained and we just go out there and make sure that the public can use the lands that they're paying for.
Arntsen: What's going to happen without the trail crew?
Chris: They definitely struggle to keep these trails maintained, and I know a lot of people within town end up going out and they feel that it's necessary for themselves to do their own work and a lot of the time they'll end up going out there and they'll end up cutting trees that don't need to be cut. It just ends up becoming overgrown and the trails start to dissolve and it takes, you know, it takes a couple of years, but eventually the trails will disappear without use or without maintenance. Hearing stories of what it was like back in the 9. 90s and early 2000s. People who just love mountain biking so much they would go out and they would just cut a swath of land that they was like, oh yeah, this is a perfect route. Like let's cut down these trees and so that has a huge impact. We could lose this place so fast. It's a very, very fragile ecology, especially those high mountains in the slow desert. You're ripping around, you're tearing up the cryptos soil, you're destroying vegetation, you're destroying what's holding everything together.
Arntsen: I'm also curious what the effects are going to be on the community of a place like MOAB that has so many federal employees and so many of whom are seasonal or probationary and you know, are you going to stay in MOAB or your coworkers who were fired, are they going to be able to stay in moab, whats going to happen
Chris: I know a lot of us that work in this office already have our lives established here the reason i stayed here was solely for this job but I've been making a life here I work at a local shop in town and every day I go to work, my managers don't understand why we have a lack of consumers coming into the shop.
Arntsen: So tourists are not coming to MOAB. They're not coming into the shop because everyone's looking at what's happening with, you know, the park service, etc. and they're not going on vacation.
Chris: Yeah, yeah, I've heard from people who say that they've heard that people are cancelling reservations that they made to local hotels, that they're very concerned that there's not going to be enough employees to monitor our national parks, and so they're already canceling their trips out here that they probably made last year.
Arntsen: Since the initial round of cuts, federal agencies have been asked to create a plan that would reduce staff numbers even further.
These plans are due on March 13th, just one day before the government faces shutdown if Congress doesn't pass a budget.