Federal employees dismissed from their positions hung an American flag upside-down from the summit of the iconic El Capitan in Yosemite National Park.
The dismissed employees hung the flag Saturday, so visitors to the park were greeted with the image of the desecrated national symbol as they flocked to El Capitan to watch the seasonal “firefall” at Horsetail Falls. The falls are illuminated by a fiery orange glow when the rays of the setting sun hit the massive rock formation in February.
The disgruntled government workers told NBC News in a series of Tuesday interviews that the stunt was a call of “distress” over federal downsizing and the purported privatization of public lands.
Andria Townsend, who worked at Yosemite researching the fisher, a relative of the otter, told NBC News that “it seems clear they are trying to destabilize and decentralize.”
“That’s how we lose public lands and start resource extractions,” she claimed.
NBC News nevertheless observed that the White House said in a previous statement that the administration will “continue to protect America’s abundant natural resources while streamlining federal agencies to better serve the American people.”
Olek Chmura, a former Yosemite custodial worker, added that hanging the flag upside-down is a “huge statement.”
“It’s always been a sign of the country being in distress, and to put it up over Horsetail Falls over the weekend is to tell people to wake up and look around,” the dismissed employee added.
Chmura was two months away from finishing his probationary period when he was fired alongside 1,000 other National Park Service employees.
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He said he believes Yosemite lost about 11 employees in the cuts.
“We were already unstaffed,” he continued. “And it’s not even peak travel season.”
Townsend said she was glad to see the upside-down flag.
“Yosemite has the advantage of being so well known,” she said. “When people think of national parks, they think of Yosemite, so we have the leverage to really make a difference.”
According to NBC News, the employee who organized the Saturday protest is a former ranger who did not want her name used publicly because she actually wants to be rehired.
While some park visitors reportedly clapped and cheered when the flag was unfurled, others were upset that these entitled employees were blocking their view of the waterfall, which many had surely paid thousands of dollars to come and see.
“People are standing up and people are listening,” the ranger claimed. “We’re going to keep fighting. Federal employees across all agencies matter.”
While the dozen or fewer Yosemite employees who lost their jobs amid the government efficiency efforts may have been impressed, it’s hard to imagine that park visitors took kindly to the gesture, not to mention the millions of other taxpayers across the nation who are now hearing about the stunt.
The vast majority of Americans are deeply in favor of spending cuts.
They do not like the fact that they are asked to fork over a massive portion of their paychecks — right around this time of year, by the way — to bankroll a vast administrative state that until recently has not even tried to be efficient.
Hanging the Stars and Stripes upside-down over a national landmark due to the firing of about 11 employees only makes those workers lose even more sympathy.
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