(NewsNation) — Dolly Parton’s estate has appointed a member of the country music icon’s family as its brand ambassador amid escalating tensions with another family member.

Danielle Parton, the “Jolene” singer’s niece, was named brand ambassador and will help publicly support the singer’s $450 million business empire.

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“Being a Parton means hard work, big dreams and never forgetting where you came from,” Danielle Parton said in an Instagram Reel. “I’m proud to be part of that legacy and to carry it on in my own way.”

Danielle Parton’s appointment comes at a time when Dolly Parton’s estate is in turmoil.

Estate fires Dolly’s nephew

Bryan Seaver, Dolly Parton’s nephew and head of security for decades, was fired by her estate in September after her manager, Danny Nozell, accused him of threatening the country icon’s employees and business partners.

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Nozell’s company, She’s Alive, presented emails and text messages in court from Seaver allegedly showing him trying to tarnish his aunt’s business partnerships.

Dolly Parton rehearses for the 2016 Christmas in Rockefeller Center -(Photo by: Virginia Sherwood/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images via Getty Images)

He wrote in a message that he would “set up a podcast dedicated to ruining Dolly’s brand partnerships and telling the violations these people have done on us. It’s going to be great. Or f—— pay me,” NBC News reported.

A Nashville judge has ordered Seaver to stay 1,000 feet away from everyone connected to the business. Seaver says the company owed his firm more than $250,000 for completed work. In an affidavit, he called the texts “a private conversation between two friends who were both grieving.” Parton’s family says there is no feud.

What Dolly Parton Said in Her Last Interview Should Terrify Us

olly Parton did so much in her life to help others. In her final days, I think she did one last thing that will help millions of people, if we pay attention to her warning and take action.

Just four days before she died, Parton said that she was being treated for health problems that she “didn’t pay attention to when I was watching over Carl.” She was talking about the years she spent caring for her husband through a long illness. The interview moved on to her upcoming projects, and that line went by so quickly that most people missed it. As we reflect on her death, I think it was a clear wake-up call to America.

This is caregiving in 2026. More than 60 million Americans are going through it, a 45% increase over the past decade. We are struggling in the shadows at great sacrifice to our own health and well-being, and caregiving rarely gets airtime as few people want to hear about it. Even worse, hardly anyone wants to talk about it.

In my mid-30s, I suddenly became a spousal caregiver for my wife through her cancer battle. It took an enormous toll on my own health, and woke me up to the harsh realities that millions of Americans face. I realized that supporting caregivers is one of the biggest unmet societal needs of our time, and I decided to dedicate the rest of my life to helping caregivers.

I left my thriving career as a hedge fund manager to build a social impact organization CareYaya, where I’ve worked directly to help thousands of caregivers, people taking care of their spouses and their aging parents, who are caring for loved ones through serious illness, dementia or disability. The toll that millions of us are facing is enormous and completely in the shadows.

But with our rapidly aging population, rising rates of dementia, cancer, and serious illness, all of which place a huge caregiving burden on spouses or adult children, I think now is a critical time to talk about caregiving, before it totally breaks our society. Parton’s death can be the wake-up call to change the societal narrative and bring about much-needed changes to support caregivers.

Parton’s own words suggest that for years, her health was going untended while she tended someone else’s, and that no one caught it. In October 2025, when posting a video to quiet fans who had begun to worry about her health, she said that while Carl was sick and after he died, “I didn’t take care of myself,” and that she had let things slide. A few months later in March 2026, opening the season at Dollywood, she said she had gotten “worn down and worn out.” And in August 2026, she said it a final time, only four days before she passed. For years, one of the most famous women in America was doing the unseen and unheralded work of a caregiver.