Targeting DOGE, labor group puts up billboards warning of heat deaths at national parks
An early-season heat wave has scorched much of the West with dangerously hot conditions, prompting an extreme heat warning that extended from Friday to late Saturday. Triple-digit highs were widespread across southern Nevada, and temperatures over 115 degrees were expected in Death Valley.
Such extreme heat weeks before the official start of summer added urgency to More Perfect Union’s message. The organization’s billboard campaign is targeting broad impacts of DOGE’s layoffs and cuts to the nation’s most popular national parks. In the Southwest, that meant zeroing in on extreme heat, Shakir said.
“We had to tailor the message to get at where the rubber meets the road,” he said.
The full consequences of National Park Service reductions remain to be seen, and peak summer tourism season is looming.
Abigail Wines, acting deputy superintendent of Death Valley National Park, said park employees are working to keep the public safe and raise awareness about the dangers of extreme heat. She encouraged people to take necessary precautions before visiting Death Valley, such as checking for weather alerts or closures and packing adequate water, sunscreen and other essentials.
“As always, the National Park Service is working to provide visitors with amazing, safe and memorable experiences in Death Valley National Park, and throughout the country,” Wines told NBC News in a statement.
More Perfect Union’s bigger goal with its billboard campaign is to bring attention to DOGE’s controversial work and the Trump administration’s sweeping cuts to federal agencies. Shakir said the organization purposefully used the bipartisan support that national parks enjoy as a way to provoke debate.
A 2024 poll from the Pew Research Center found that the National Park Service was the most popular federal agency, with 76% favorability among the more than 9,400 Americans surveyed.
“A lot of places we put the billboards in are in red areas, where it’s assumed that a lot of people may have voted for Donald Trump, like Donald Trump and even like components of DOGE, quite frankly,” Shakir said. “But with national parks, we thought this was a good example of where they’ve gone way too far.”