Perspectives: The Bundy mistrial, the government’s false narrative is exposed

by Bryan Hyde

Those who maintain that what happened in Bunkerville in April of 2014 was simply about Cliven Bundy’s cows and the federal Bureau of Land Management are getting a much needed reality check. It was a symptom of a much larger long-term problem involving government power being exercised without proper limits or accountability. When Judge Gloria Navarro declared a mistrial in the case against Cliven, Ammon and Ryan Bundy last week, virtually no one in the courtroom was shocked. Even the most openly hostile media representatives who have been covering the Bundys could see the writing on the wall. The official narrative, which falsely depicted the defendants as dangerous, violent men who posed a deadly threat to government officers and the public in general, had been breaking up on the rocks of reality for some time. Federal indictments were revealed to be long on melodrama and short on substance and did not accurately reflect what happened in Bunkerville in back in 2014. As more and more facts found their way to daylight, a very different picture began to emerge as to who were the aggressors and who were the victims in this case...more