Posted on 04/10/2014 10:35:30 AM PDT by bimboeruption
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports that two militia members from Montana and one from Utah have arrived at Cliven Bundy’s ranch.
“We need to be the barrier between the oppressed and the tyrants,” Ryan Payne of the West Mountain Rangers told the Review-Journal. “Expect to see a band of soldiers.”
Payne said that militias from New Hampshire, Texas and Florida are likely to join and stand with Bundy and stay at his ranch.
“They all tell me they are in the process of mobilizing as we speak,” Payne told the Review-Journal, adding that hundreds of militia members are expected.
The Review-Journal also reports that Bundy’s son, Ammon Bundy, was shot with a stun gun by law enforcement officers Wednesday and that the rancher’s sister, Margaret Houston, was pushed to the ground.
“I pulled the tasers out of him,” Cheryl Teerlink told the Review-Journal.
Lawmakers are adding their voices into the fray, criticizing the federal cattle roundup fought by Cliven Bundy who claims longstanding grazing rights on remote public rangeland about 80 miles northeast of Las Vegas.
Sen. Dean Heller of Nevada said he told new U.S. Bureau of Land Management chief Neil Kornze in Washington, D.C., that law-abiding Nevadans shouldn’t be penalized by an “overreaching” agency.
Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval pointed earlier to what he called “an atmosphere of intimidation,” resulting from the roundup and said he believed constitutional rights were being trampled.
Heller said he heard from local officials, residents and the Nevada Cattlemen’s Association and remained “extremely concerned about the size of this closure and disruptions with access to roads, water and electrical infrastructure.”
The federal government has shut down a scenic but windswept area about half the size of the state of Delaware to round up about 900 cattle it says are trespassing.
BLM and National Park Service officials didn’t immediately respond Wednesday to criticisms of the roundup that started Saturday and prompted the closure of the 1,200-square-mile area through May 12.
It’s seen by some as the latest battle over state and federal land rights in a state with deep roots in those disputes, including the Sagebrush Rebellion of the 1970s and ’80s. Nevada, where various federal agencies manage or control more than 80 percent of the land, is among several Western states where ranchers have challenged federal land ownership.
The current showdown pits Bundy’s claims of ancestral rights to graze his cows on open range against federal claims that the cattle are trespassing on arid and fragile habitat of the endangered desert tortoise. Bundy has said he owns about 500 branded cattle on the range and claims the other 400 targeted for roundup are his, too.
BLM and Park Service officials see threats in Bundy’s promise to “do whatever it takes” to protect his property and in his characterization that the dispute constitutes a “range war.”
U.S. Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Las Vegas, noted that BLM officials were enforcing federal court orders that Bundy remove his animals. The legal battle has been waged for decades.
Kornze, the new BLM chief, is familiar with the area. He’s a natural resource manager who grew up in Elko, Nev., and served previously as a senior adviser to Senate Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid.
Reid aide Kristen Orthman said her boss “hopes the trespassing cattle are rounded up safely so the issue can be resolved.”
Sandoval, a former state attorney general and federal district court judge, weighed in late Tuesday after several days of media coverage about blocked roads and armed federal agents fanning out around Bundy’s ranch while contractors using helicopters and vehicles herd cows into portable pens in rugged and remote areas.
“No cow justifies the atmosphere of intimidation which currently exists nor the limitation of constitutional rights that are sacred to all Nevadans,” the governor said in a statement.
Sandoval said he was most offended that armed federal officials have tried to corral people protesting the roundup into a fenced-in “First Amendment area” south of the resort city of Mesquite.
The site “tramples upon Nevadans’ fundamental rights under the U.S. Constitution” and should be dismantled, Sandoval said.
BLM spokeswoman Kirsten Cannon and Park Service spokeswoman Christie Vanover have told reporters during daily conference calls that free-speech areas were established so agents could ensure the safety of contractors, protesters, the rancher and his supporters.
The dispute between Bundy and the federal government dates to 1993, when land managers cited concern for the federally protected tortoise and capped his herd at 150 animals on a 250-square-mile rangeland allotment. Officials later revoked Bundy’s grazing rights completely.
Cannon said Bundy racked up more than $1.1 million in unpaid grazing fees over the years while disregarding several court orders to remove his animals.
Bundy estimates the unpaid fees total about $300,000. He notes that his Mormon family’s 19th century melon farm and ranch operation in surrounding areas predates creation of the BLM in 1946.
Since the cattle roundup began Saturday, there has been one arrest.
Bundy’s son, Dave Bundy, 37, was taken into custody Sunday as he watched the roundup from State Route 170. He was released Monday with bruises on his face and a citation accusing him of refusing to disperse and resisting arrest.
A court date has not been set.
His mother, Carol Bundy, alleged that her son was roughed up by BLM police.
Meanwhile, federal officials say 277 cows have been collected. Cannon said state veterinarian and brand identification officials will determine what becomes of the impounded cattle.
Yes as a matter of fact.
How come the Federal government is only concerned with rules and law when it pertains to legitimate Americans, yet aid and abet those who routinely violate federal law when they enter US land illegally?
Because the federal government is a bunch of fat-cat bureaucrats seeking a totally cowed and dependent populace who will further its lust for power and feed its greed?
So why do you support and or side with a punitive controlling tyrannical force who wants to basically bury us, who picks and chooses which laws it going to enforce?
There is a section of Arizona along the border that is under the control of squatter illegals. The feds put up signs along the perimeter warning of the danger.
Now they send federal agents against an American rancher for not paying the grazing fees. Kind of like issuing the death penalty for an overdue book.
That is a big reasons a lot of Americans are pissed off about this. The feds are taking the path of least resistance. They go after a perceived weak target instead of protecting our borders from the drug army scum.
And we get to pay for all this to boot.
excellent points dragnet. Why would anyone today, given what we have seen the last 20 years, be so fierce to justify ANY Federal Govt action is rather odd at minimum, and maybe not to be trusted.
You’re wrong. We have long since passed the abuses that justified Lexington and Concord.
This was bound to happen sooner or later.
Government creates issue. Government escalates issue. Citizen gets fed up and decides not to obey the masters. Government brings in armed agents. Government takes citizens property. Citizens band together and get even more fed up. Citizens take up arms.
All because of a G-damn turtle and an overreaching POS government.
PEOPLE ARE FED UP!
Begs the question:
If they have this many agents to round up illegal cattle, why can’t they round up illegal aliens?
The land in question was purchased from Mexico for $15 million 16 years before Nevada became a state. It is "territory or other property belonging to the United States" under Article IV Section 3. Nevada disclaimed the land when it became a state. The isn't a States' Rights issue.
Add to that this. He’s wrong.
The Constitution does not give the fed gov willy nilly right to own land just because it wants to.
The Constitution places very strict limits on what the fed gov can own, and this here part of land under contention ain’t it. Not even close.
Because cows don’t shoot at them.
“First Amendment Areas” defy the very concept of the First Amendment. Eff you, Feral Government, and your harsh locational restrictions on a GOD GIVEN RIGHT.
AMEN. Bump that.
They are willing to send multiple agents from multiple agencies to Nevada while at the same time they are telling the border patrol to stand down.
Priorities.
Rather like the latest joke in Virginia:
What’s the difference between a Virginia coal miner and a polar bear?
Senator Mark Warner cares about polar bears.
The Constitution does not give the fed gov the right to own land other than for reasons listed in the sections you listed.
This particular piece of land fits none of the requirements for fed gov ownership.
Claiming that the word “territory” gives it that right is the same purposeful misuse as the progressives pulled when they claimed the word “welfare” gave them the right to start a federal vote buying scheme using federal tax monies simply because he called the program “welfare”.
I don’t. Just because I think Bundy is wrong (legally and morally) doesn’t mean I support the actions of the BLM or the federal government. I’m ALL IN on putting the beast in its place, but this ain’t the hill I wanna die on. I’d gladly pick a hill on the border and stand with you. (I think you know that.)
...and because so far...
...cows don't VOTE...
Fedcoats - I like it!
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