President Donald Trump’s effort, with considerable aid from Elon Musk, to shrink the federal government and its appetite for tax dollars, is relatively popular based on polling.

The president’s approval rating hasn’t dipped significantly, and in some polls it has risen a bit, during the past couple weeks as the DOGE — Department of Government Efficiency — campaign has accelerated.

Trump is trying to fulfill one of the main planks of his platform, and many Americans who voted for him celebrate his progress.

Recently, the administration fired thousands of federal employees, from many agencies, who were on “probationary” status. In many, but not all, cases that means workers who had been in their job for less than a year.

The tally in Northeastern Oregon is not certain, but it appears that more than 50 workers from the U.S. Forest Service, one of the larger federal employers in the region, were fired.

Other federal agencies with employees living in Northeastern Oregon include the Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Farm Service Agency and National Weather Service.

What effect, if any, trimming the workforce could have on people who visit any part of the approximately 5.5 million acres of public land the Forest Service manages in the region is unsure.

The administration says federal firefighting forces won’t be affected. But the arbitrary nature of the terminations, based on probationary status rather than a thorough look at what the employees actually did, lends credence to concerns the firings could have unintended consequences.

Firefighting at a minimum should be exempt from Trump’s cuts, given the prevalence of wildfires in the Blue Mountains during the past couple decades. Last year’s wildfire season was the worst on record, in terms of acres burned. The administration ought to be focusing on ensuring the Forest Service and other agencies that respond to blazes on public land, including the BLM, have the resources they need, including of course people, to deal with the 2025 fire season.

If the administration truly wants to make agencies more efficient without sacrificing the services they provide to the public, then the firing strategy should be more nuanced than relying solely on employees’ probationary status.

It’s hardly implausible to wonder whether the firings might slow work on projects important to Northeastern Oregon residents and its economy, such as timber sales and grazing permits.

Regardless, these job cuts are likely to have harmful effects in our region, even if this doesn’t include how public land is managed and enjoyed.

The fired employees at least temporarily will be without paychecks.

This is not helpful to the local businesses that these workers, like the rest of us, patronize. Particularly if some former federal employees move, as some of them almost certainly will.

According to the Oregon Employment Department, in December 2024 there were 1,230 federal employees in the region of Baker, Grant, Union, Wallowa, Umatilla and Morrow counties.

Many people are pleased to watch Trump and Musk cut swathes through the federal government. Any reasonable person recognizes the gargantuan federal budget can get by without every dollar it has been siphoning as America’s national debt nears $37 trillion.

But reasonable people also need to acknowledge that some of those dollars are — or were — earned by federal employees, not given as grants for spurious purposes. And those dollars fuel not Washington, D.C., special interests or researchers in other countries. Those dollars enrich local businesses that we all rely on for products, services and, of course, jobs.

It’s gratifying to read about the latest expensive anthill DOGE has kicked over.

But to believe Trump’s trims only affect wastrels somewhere else, that we are immune and can only benefit, is to indulge in fantasy.

Jayson Jacoby is the editor of the Baker City Herald. Contact him at 541-518-2088 or jjacoby@bakercityherald.com.