Court rules in favor of BLM wild horse gather

The BLM claimed a recent victory in the ongoing battle between public lands grazing and wild horses. Chief Judge Beryl Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District Court of Columbia ruled in favor of the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM’s) proposal to conduct a large horse gather on Feb. 13. BLM proposed a plan in 2018 to gather more than 1,700 feral horses from the Caliente Herd Area in southeast Nevada. Ryan Zinke, in his official capacity as then-secretary of the Department of the Interior, and Brian Steed, in his role as acting director of BLM, were immediately faced with a lawsuit for the proposal. Horse advocacy groups American Wild Horse Campaign and the Cloud Foundation, along with environmental group Western Watersheds Project and a private citizen, were the plaintiffs of the suit. The groups argued BLM’s decision violated the agency’s obligation under the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act (WHBA) of 1971 to “‘protect and manage’ these ‘wild and free-roaming’ horses as ‘living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West’ and to ensure that ‘all management activities shall be at the minimal feasible level.’” Judge Howell ruled that was not the case in her 45-page opinion. “BLM’s 2018 gather decision was issued after the agency took a sufficiently ‘hard look’ at the environmental impacts of that action, considered reasonable alternatives, and disclosed relevant environmental information to the public to enable participation in the process,” Howell wrote...MORE