Working land does not give you title to it. The new area he has been grazing is an area he did not use prior to losing his 1998 court case. From the 50s on, he accepted the BLM’s authority to set grazing limits. If you spend decades paying someone to use their land, it is hard to then claim you own the land because you have been using it!
And remember, he first rejected paying the BLM after 12 years of Republican Presidents had managed the BLM, including 8 years of Ronald Reagan.
If he had argued water rights or some other principle, he might have made a case. But arguing that the federal government didn’t own the land, when the Nevada State Constitution specifically says they do, is a tough sale to a court...
“Working land does not give you title to it.”
How, precisely, did the feds end up with the title to that land? East of the Mississippi there are treaties and land sales recorded where land was ‘bought’ from the Native American tribes who lived there. Is there any such record of this land being purchased from the Native Americans in that area?