National Park ranger fired from "dream job" on Valentine's Day pens emotional viral letter: "Things are not ok"

When Brian Gibbs woke up on Valentine's Day on Friday, it was just another morning of getting to do what he loved at his "dream job" as an education park ranger at Effigy Mounds National Monument in Iowa. By that afternoon, the father and husband said he was "absolutely heartbroken and completely devastated" to have been one of hundreds of National Park Service employees suddenly fired from their jobs.

"Access to my government email was denied mid-afternoon and my position was ripped out from out under my feet after my shift was over at 3:45pm on a cold snowy Friday," Gibbs wrote in a viral Facebook post. "Additionally, before I could fully print off my government records, I was also locked out of my electronic personal file that contained my secure professional records."

About 3,400 recently hired employees with the U.S. Forest Service and 1,000 employees with the National Park Service were fired from their jobs over the weekend under the Trump administration, accounting for 10% and 5% of those workforces, respectively. Seasonal employees will be exempt from a hiring freeze for the National Park Service.