A National Park Service ranger who was fired from the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park will accompany U.S. Sen. Mark R. Warner as his guest to President Donald Trump‘s joint address to Congress tomorrow.
Ashley Ranalli, 41, of Fredericksburg worked at the military park until last month with exemplary performance reviews. She was one of an estimated more than 1,000 Park Service workers who were indiscriminately fired by the Trump Administration due to their “probationary” employment status, joining thousands of other federal workers who were fired without cause as part of Elon Musk and President Trump’s attacks on the workforce. Ranalli is a survivor of thyroid cancer and now has no health insurance.
“Ashley Ranalli is one of the many dedicated public servants who have been forced out of their jobs serving Americans by President Trump and Elon Musk. Our national parks are places where we connect with nature, our shared history and one another, and that is made possible by the hard work of national park rangers, whose dedication, expertise, and passion not only safeguard our landscapes and wildlife but also help preserve the stories and history that make these places so special. These indiscriminate cuts of Park Service personnel are devastating to the parks and their local communities. I am glad that Ashley is able to join as my guest for the address to Congress, so that President Trump can look out into the audience and face a Virginian directly affected by his short-sighted and reckless choices,” Warner said.
Ranalli said that becoming a national park ranger was her dream and it came true after years of dedication and hard work.
“I am devastated by the effect the purge of federal employees has had on Fredericksburg, a community that I love and which relies upon federal workers and tourism dollars from the national park. When I come to Washington, I hope to represent not just my fellow park rangers, but also to be a voice for the people, communities and small businesses that are suffering because of political choices being made in our nation’s capital,” Ranalli said.
Ranalli was hired as a volunteer and youth program coordinator at the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park in fall 2024. Prior to becoming a park ranger, she taught English at a public school and spent her summers working as a seasonal worker for the National Park Service, living away from her family at various NPS sites in Virginia to demonstrate commitment to the job and distinguish herself from a pool of largely younger candidates. On February 14, she received a layoff notice from the Department of the Interior, despite a recent performance review that described her work as “excellent” and “outstanding,” and which noted that she “goes the extra mile” when working with visitors, volunteers and colleagues.
While the administration has declined to make public the exact scope of the cuts at NPS and the duties and locations of those affected by the layoffs, the National Parks Conservation Association estimates that in a period of just weeks, 9 percent of NPS staff were lost to mass firings and resignations, as well as hundreds of vacant positions that cannot be filled because of a hiring freeze. The National Park Service has been directed to identify more cuts as part of the larger Reduction in Force (RIF) efforts.
Warner is the author of the Great American Outdoors Act, one of the largest-ever investments in conservation and public lands in our nation’s history. Signed into law by Trump in 2020, the bipartisan legislation provided billions of dollars to improve infrastructure and expand recreation opportunities in national parks and other public lands after years of underinvestment led a massive backlog in needed maintenance and repairs to Park Service sites.
In Virginia alone, Warner’s Great American Outdoors Act has provided more than $470 million for projects at Virginia’s 22 park service units and supported thousands of jobs – investments that are now being undermined by the Trump administration’s reckless layoffs that threaten safe operations at the parks ahead of the peak summer season. Last month, Warner led the Virginia delegation in writing the Secretary of the Interior and pushing the administration to reverse the cuts.
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Rebecca Barnabi
