Ammon Bundy arrested in trespassing case at St. Luke’s

 Ammon Bundy, an independent candidate for governor of Idaho and far-right activist, was arrested early Saturday morning at St. Luke’s Meridian Medical Center on suspicion of misdemeanor trespassing. He failed to leave the property in relation to a child welfare case, according to Meridian Police. 

The incident came two days before Bundy is scheduled to stand trial on three charges from a previous trespassing case at the Idaho Capitol. In the latest incident, Bundy was arrested around 1:15 a.m. Saturday morning, said Kelsey Johnston, spokesperson for the police department.

“He was asked to leave the property and did not,” Johnston told the Idaho Statesman. Bundy’s gubernatorial campaign manager, Wendy Kay Whitaker, was also arrested, on suspicion of trespassing at the hospital, and two people were arrested earlier Friday in a related incident on suspicion of resisting or obstructing police.

He was asked to leave the property and did not,” Johnston told the Idaho Statesman. Bundy’s gubernatorial campaign manager, Wendy Kay Whitaker, was also arrested, on suspicion of trespassing at the hospital, and two people were arrested earlier Friday in a related incident on suspicion of resisting or obstructing police.

In a Saturday post on Twitter, Bundy wrote that “last night my very good friend Diego’s grandson was medically kidnapped because a medical practitioner called (child protective services) for a missed doctor appointment. If this happened to them, it could happen to you.” In an earlier statement from his campaign, Bundy said that the incident was “an ambush arrest with no legal grounds.”...MORE

Rancher who led armed occupation of federal refuge announces run for Idaho governor

 

Ammon Bundy, a leader of the 2016 armed occupation at a federal refuge, has announced his candidacy for governor of Idaho.

Bundy, in a video posted on Saturday, said he is running for governor because he is “sick and tired of all of this political garbage just like you are.”

“I’m tired of our freedoms being taken from us, and I’m tired of the corruption that is rampant in our state government,” he added.Bundy, who is running as a Republican, will join the GOP primary to challenge Idaho Gov. Brad Little (R).

Idaho Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin (R) announced her candidacy last month, after she and Little spent more than a year sparring over pandemic measures, including emergency declarations and lockdowns...MORE

Far-Right Vigilante’s ‘Alarming’ Gubernatorial Run Has Some Bracing for Chaos ‘THIS COULD BE DANGEROUS’

Note: if you want to know what the far-left thinks of Mr. Bundy and what he has been up to, this is your ticket... 

BOISE, Idaho—Far-right agitator Ammon Bundy’s emerging bid to become the next governor of Idaho faces a peculiar roadblock: he is currently barred from entering the state Capitol where he would ostensibly need to conduct official business after being arrested there twice within 24 hours.

These days, Bundy—who along with his father Cliven became national icons of far-right resistance in the Obama era—is perhaps best known as the founder of the “People’s Rights” network. Since last spring, the group has led rowdy protests outside the homes of elected officials. In a move that foreshadowed the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, the group stormed Idaho’s own Capitol building last summer.

The tactics are pure political intimidation, Bundy’s opponents have charged. Now, his seeking elected office is rattling some Idahoans, who say a campaign represents another step toward legitimizing anti-democratic tactics on the right.

Either way, it could get ugly.

The inauspicious beginnings of People’s Rights came at a poorly-attended meeting on March 26, 2020, in a drafty warehouse in the sleepy town of Emmett. Ammon Bundy, clad in his trademark black cowboy hat, blazer, and jeans, addressed a few dozen people in front of a neglected batting cage, urging them to band together to defend their rights.

The mood in the warehouse was restless and angry, with the crowd outraged by Idaho’s early pandemic restrictions, quoting and misquoting America’s founding documents while throwing around words like “tyrants.”

Bundy told them they needed to take that anger into the streets.

"It’s not calling up my legislators and saying, ‘I don’t like this, I think you should vote this way,’” he said. “That’s not what it is. It is all of us going to the governor’s house and saying, ‘You will not do this. We are not OK with it.’ We are going to his house, we’re going to go to this director of Health and Welfare’s house."

In his talk that day, Bundy suggested that even if 150 million Americans died from the pandemic, it wouldn’t justify government restrictions on gathering.

In an interview with The Daily Beast, Bundy defended the tactics and said People’s Rights would continue protesting at public officials’ homes.

“Someone who goes into the public square and becomes a representative or official, that’s what they should expect,” he said. “What we’re lacking, in my opinion, is that personal accountability in public officials.”

The bravado has worked. Fueled by backlash to anti-COVID measures, People’s Rights has grown to upwards of 40,000 people with branches from coast to coast, according to extremism experts. The group is organized so that it can mobilize members at short notice. And increasingly, local officials are on the receiving end of those calls to action—with their homes in the crosshairs, just as Bundy insisted.

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Ammon Bundy's Ongoing Religious War

 Ammon Bundy, right-wing malcontent behind the 2016 armed takeover of Oregon’s Malheur Wildlife Refuge and now a western anti-mask movement, believes he’s doing God’s work. 

Coming from a long line of religiously inspired men who have been “called” to defend the US Constitution, Bundy has varied in his focus, from rebelling against public land ranching regulations to protesting COVID-19 safety protocols. But in his view, these are all forms of government tyranny and affronts to constitutional rights. Arrested for the fourth time on March 15, 2021, Bundy was taken into custody for failing to appear at his hearing on past trespassing charges. Because he refused to wear a mask into the courtroom, thereby missing his trial, he was apprehended outside amid of a throng of other protesters.

 

Bundy’s crusade has been a long time in the making, but in the last year he successfully established a coalition of supporters that is broad, diverse, and a serious threat to federal law. His group is called the People’s Rights Network. Like the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, it includes members who see the current government as a threat to perceived rights and are committed to defend their ideas of personal liberty, by force if necessary.

 

So what has taken Ammon Bundy, who first came to prominence during the 2014 armed standoff in Nevada over his father’s unpaid grazing fees and trespassing cattle, into a life of an anti-government militant? The answer is a libertarian worldview and his take on Mormonism. Bundy’s ideology parallels the thinking of certain leaders in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who’ve had a history of government cynicism. He also shares with them a tradition of theo-constitutionalism--venerating the Constitution as a sacred document. The paradox here is that Bundy believes he is upholding the Constitution and fulfilling his religious duties in his acts of lawlessness.

 

His impetus has roots in the early Church. After the founder and first prophet of Mormonism, Joseph Smith (1805-1844) was murdered, Brigham Young (1801-1877) assumed the reins of the Church and brought the Latter-day Saints into the Great Basin. By that point, Young and his brethren were disgusted with the US government after the years of mistreatment and bigotry they had faced. But the Mormon people kept great faith in the Constitution. While still an apostle of Smith, Young said “I find no fault with the Constitution or laws of our country; they are good enough. It is the abuse of those laws which I despise, and which God, good men and angels abhor.” He later avowed “ Corrupt men cannot walk these streets with impunity, and if that is alienism to the Government, amen to it. The Constitution of the United States we sustain all the day long, and it will sustain and shield us, while the men who say we are aliens, and cry out ‘Mormon disturbance,’ will go to hell….But to proceed; the principal evil is in the rulers, or those who profess to be rulers, and in the dispensers of the law…”

 

Young was not just the leader of the Church; like Smith, he was a prophet. Although he was not as prolific in his revelations as other Mormon prophet/presidents, these statements are memorialized in the Journal of Discourses and the History of the Church, texts not part of official Church doctrine, but significant, especially to those with radical leanings. Over the years, many Church prophets echoed Young’s sentiments, from Wilford Woodruff (1807-1898) to Ezra Taft Benson (1899-1994), reinforcing the idea that the Constitution is good, but not those who govern under it. Benson took that idea further, declaring that the Mormon people had a religious obligation to protect the Constitution, even if this meant violence. In 1979 he declared, “I say to you with all the fervor of my soul that God intended men to be free. Rebellion against tyranny is a righteous cause. It is an enormous evil for any man to be enslaved to any system contrary to his own will. For that reason men, 200 years ago, pledged their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. No nation which has kept the commandments of God has ever perished, but I say to you that once freedom is lost, only blood – human blood – will win it back.”

 

So this is where things get treacherous. If the Constitution is sacred, but those overseeing it are evil, then who determines and upholds the law of the land?...

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Bundy to Biden: Stay away from my cattle

Jennifer Yachnin

Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy is vowing to once again "walk towards guns" should the incoming Biden administration attempt to collect on more than two decades of debt from trespass fines and unpaid grazing fees.

Bundy, who came to national attention in 2014 when he rallied armed supporters to his Bunkerville ranch to block the government's attempted roundup of his cattle, made the remarks Saturday in an interview with radio host Pete Santilli.

"The Bundy ranch saga will continue, won't it? Do you believe so? Do you believe that they'll come after you?" asked Santilli, who stuck a plea deal over his own role in the Nevada standoff (Greenwire, Oct. 9, 2017).

"Yes, I do," Bundy replied. "They've been waiting for this ... but it's not only for Bundy ranch; it's for all Americans. We're in trouble if it changes."

He later added: "We're going to have to go forward. If we have to walk forward towards guns, which we did at the Bundy ranch, we have to do that. And we have to have faith."

...Whether the Biden administration, which has named New Mexico Rep. Deb Haaland (D) as its nominee to lead the Interior Department, will opt to address the 74-year-old rancher and scofflaw remains an open question.

Some public lands advocates suggested privately to E&E News that the newest White House occupant and his team will have more pressing issues to attend to following next week's inauguration — like rolling back the impacts of President Trump's "energy dominance" agenda and efforts to weaken the National Environmental Policy Act.

But Western Watersheds Project Executive Director Erik Molvar asserted that last week's riot at the U.S. Capitol, which resulted in the deaths of five individuals including a Capitol Police officer, could reinvigorate the government's interest in tamping down on Bundy's continued defiance.

"The lax law enforcement on public lands can be seen as a direct line to the lawlessness we saw in the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, Recapture Canyon in Utah and now in Washington, D.C.," Molvar said, referring to the 2016 wildlife refuge occupation that involved two of Bundy's sons and to an illegal all-terrain vehicle protest ride in the canyon in 2015.

...Public Lands Council Executive Director Kaitlynn Glover told E&E News that Bundy should not be conflated with the "taxpaying, law-abiding" ranchers her organization represents.

"We do not support unlawful activities or calls for violence," Glover said. "The ranchers we represent who graze livestock on public lands pay their grazing fees, follow the rules, and cherish the responsibilities of stewarding America's public lands. They expect other ranchers to do the same."

She added: "Do not mistake those who have anti-American sentiments as representatives of our community just because they wear a cowboy hat "

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Note: article is from Jan., but I just came across it and thought it worthy of posting. You should read all of it.

Trump gives permit to ranchers whose case led to occupation

Dwight Hammond, left, is greeted by his wife after getting out of prison

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management in the final days of the Trump administration issued a grazing permit to Oregon ranchers whose imprisonment sparked the 2016 armed takeover of a federal wildlife refuge by right-wing extremists. Interior Secretary David Bernhardt’s restored Dwight and Steven Hammond’s grazing permit earlier this week, which lasts for 10 years, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported. The father and son had their permit revoked after a jury convicted them in 2012 of arson on public lands a decade earlier. The men went to prison, served time and were released, but the U.S. Department of Justice later ordered them back to prison to finish the mandatory minimum five-year sentence. That kicked off the 41-day armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, which is 300 miles (483 kilometers) southeast of Portland. The Oregon State Police fatally shot one occupier, saying he reached for a pistol at a roadblock. The leaders of the takeover, Ammon and Ryan Bundy, and five others were later acquitted of conspiring to impede federal workers from their jobs at the refuge. In 2018, Then-President Donald Trump pardoned the Hammonds, allowing them to be freed from federal prison. In a proposal to grant the Hammonds grazing rights on Dec. 31, the land agency said Hammond Ranches should be allowed to graze their cattle on about 26,000 acres (10,522 hectares) in the high desert of eastern Oregon. The federal agency cited the Hammonds’ “extensive historic use of these allotments, past proper use of rangeland resources, a high level of general need, and advantages conferred by topography.” In 2014, when Barack Obama was president, the agency denied Hammond Ranches a renewal of its grazing permit, saying the business “does not have a satisfactory record of performance” and cited numerous incidents of arson...MORE

Trump administration pushes for grazing permits for men who inspired Bundy standoff

The Trump administration is once again pushing ahead with grazing permits for two men pardoned by President Trump whose arson conviction in part spurred the armed takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon. A new year’s eve proposal from the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) would allow Hammond Ranches to graze on lands in southeast Oregon. The ranch is operated by father-son duo Dwight and Steven Hammond who were convicted of setting fire to public lands in 2012. The BLM subsequently revoked their grazing privileges in 2014 — a move that caught the eye of Ammon Bundy, escalating to a 2016 takeover of the refuge’s headquarters. The notice from the BLM would give the Hammonds a permit “due to their extensive historic use of these allotments,” and gives the public 15 days to protest the decision...MORE

Ammon Bundy refuses to wear a mask at Emmett-Caldwell high school football game, game forced to end at half

On Friday night, the 4A high school football game between the Emmett Huskies and Caldwell Cougars was canceled at halftime after Ammon Bundy refused to wear a mask or leave school grounds. Caldwell Police told KTVB that Bundy, an Emmett native, went to the game at Caldwell High School and was told he needed to wear a mask before entering the stands. Bundy refused to wear one and stepped over to the chain-link fence around the field to watch the game. The principal and athletic director asked Bundy repeated to wear a mask or leave school grounds, according to police. Bundy refused to do either and the principal requested Caldwell police arrest Bundy for trespassing on school grounds. Officers refused to arrest Bundy, saying he "wasn't out of control and didn't appear to be a threat to anybody." Police say officers told school officials that they wouldn't physically remove Bundy from the property and that they would file a report and pass it along to the Canyon County Prosecutor. School officials then decided to cancel the game at halftime because Bundy refused officials' and police requests to leave the property. The Huskies led the Cougars 35-0 at the half. According to the director of the Idaho Department of Administration, Keith Reynolds, the notice was issued after consultation with Gov. Brad Little, Speaker of the House Scott Bedke, and Senate Pro Tem Brent Hill. "Based on the totality of the circumstances, I find that your refusal to comply with the lawful orders of government officials and peace officers threatens to interfere with or impede the conduct of legitimate government business and the primary uses of state facilities; and poses a threat you will likewise refuse to comply with lawful orders given to protect the safety of persons and property," Reynolds wrote in the notice delivered to Bundy. "You also present a threat to disrupt the legitimate business conducted there."...MORE

DuBois column: Bundy Boondoggle

 

The Ninth Circuit recently affirmed the mistrial in the Bundy case 

Bundy Boondoggle 

The saga of Cliven Bundy and his battles with the feds over livestock grazing go back many years. From a strictly administrative/legal basis, here is a quick summary: 

° In 1993, BLM sent Bundy a notice of trespass and an order to remove his cattle

° In 1998 a federal district court permanently enjoined Bundy from grazing livestock within the    Bunkerville allotment. Bundy filed an appeal and in 1999 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals denied his appeal and affirmed the lower court’s order.

° In 2011, BLM sent Bundy a notice of intent to roundup his cattle.

° In 2013 a federal district court ordered Bundy to remove his cattle within 45 days and authorized the feds to impound any cattle that were not removed. Bundy appealed and lost.

° In March of 2014, BLM issued a notice of intent to impound Bundy’s cattle, and on April 5, 2014 the roundup began. 

This was a large operation for the feds, as the court recently summarized: 

BLM made extensive preparations for “Operation Gold Butte Impound.” Coordinating with agents from the National Park Service and Federal Bureau of Investigation, BLM anticipated resistance from Bundy and his supporters. It planned to escort the contractors in and out of the area each day. BLM established a Listening Post/Observation Post (LP/OP) “strategically placed at elevated positions around the Bundy residence each evening” where agents were outfitted with binoculars, spotting scopes, night-vision goggles, and thermal-imaging devices. The LP/OP personnel were to have “agency-issued rifles with them at all times.” BLM also established a Tactical Operations Center (TOC), Forward Operating Base (FOB), a media site, and a “free speech area.”

I and many others have written about what transpired during the so-called standoff and there is no need to repeat it here, as our interest today is in the court case. Suffice it to say the feds backed down and left, handing a major victory to Bundy and his supporters. I vividly remember both the surprise and joy I personally experienced at this outcome. 

However, in March of 2016 a federal grand jury indicted nineteen individuals, including Cliven Bundy and his two sons, Ammon and Ryan, for a slate of federal crimes, including impeding federal officers, threatening federal officers, and extortion, as well as conspiracy to commit those crimes. Trial began on October 30, 2017, and that is when the government’s transgressions and abuses started coming to light. 

During the trial a bombshell memo from a BLM law enforcement officer to the Dept. of Justice was made public. In the memo, BLM Special Agent Larry C. Wooten stated, “I routinely observed, and the investigation revealed a widespread pattern of bad judgement, lack of discipline, incredible bias, unprofessionalism and misconduct, as well as likely policy, ethical and legal violations among senior and supervisory staff at the BLM’s Office of Law Enforcement and Security.” 

Wooten further stated these issues, “…made a mockery of our position of special trust and confidence, portrayed extreme unprofessional bias, adversely affected our agency’s mission and likely the trial regarding Cliven Bundy…” and “put our agency and specific law enforcement supervisors in potential legal, civil and administrative jeopardy.” 

Some of the actions taken by certain BLM officers are simply too crude to include in this publication. However, Wooten did report: 

º Conduct that was, “discriminatory, harassing and showed clear prejudice against the defendants, their supporters and Mormons.”

º Uncovered comments where BLM agents “bragged about roughing up Dave Bundy” and “grinding his face into the ground.”

º That BLM employees, “didn’t properly turn in the required discovery material (likely exculpatory evidence)”

º That one BLM Supervisor, “instigated the unprofessional monitoring of jail calls between defendants and their wives, without prosecutor or FBI consent.”

º That former BLM Special Agent-In-Charge Dan Love purposely ignored federal and state recommendations, “in order to command the most intrusive, oppressive, large scale and militaristic trespass cattle impound possible.” 

BLM Agent Wooten also say his investigation found, “excessive use of force, civil rights and policy violations.” Further, Wooten says, “there was an improper cover-up in virtually every matter that a particular BLM SAC participated in, or oversaw.”  

It also became apparent that important evidence had been withheld by the feds. The presiding judge held a series of hearings in November of 2017. Based upon those hearings the judge found the following pieces of evidence were withheld from the defense: 

° Records about surveillance at the Bundy ranch

° Records about the presence of government snipers

° FBI logs about activity at the ranch in the days leading up to the standoff

° Law enforcement assessments dating to 2012 that found the Bundys posed no threat, and

° Internal affairs reports about misconduct by BLM agents   

In total, it came to 3,300 pages of evidence withheld. As a result the judge said this represented “outrageous” abuses and “flagrant misconduct” by the prosecutors. The judge declared “a universal sense of justice has been violated” and dismissed all charges against the Bundys “with prejudice”, meaning those charges cannot be brought again.  

Unbelievably, President Trump’s Justice Department appealed this decision to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the most liberal circuit in the nation.    

On August 6 of this year the Ninth Circuit rendered their decision and I’m pleased to report the government’s CYA appeal was not successful. 

The court affirmed the prosecution was guilty of “flagrant misconduct”, with such a finding necessary for charges to be dismissed “with prejudice.” 

The court affirmed that the withholding of information about the surveillance camera “was willful rather than merely inadvertent.” The court also stated, “Rather than looking into the request and locating the documents before trial began, the government chose to fight rather than respond to the request.” 

On the withholding of evidence concerning the government’s use of snipers, the court stated: “Of particular concern is the government’s handling of evidence related to the presence of snipers. This was a hot-button issue… The government said the Bundys’ claim of “snipers” was “false” and “deceitful,” yet the government’s own documents referred to its agents as “snipers.”…”In short, the government had to know the import that any evidence regarding snipers, or agents who looked and functioned like snipers, would have in this case. Nevertheless, it withheld a slate of information…” The court also found the government’s position this evidence was irrelevant to be “preposterous and reckless.” 

With respect to the threat assessments, the court said, “…the government failed to turn over beneficial information speaking to Bundy’s potential for violence. These documents could have helped bolster the defense’s claim that the government had engaged in an overmilitarized impound operation that the Bundys claim fueled their fears of being surrounded by snipers. But irrespective of the theory defendants were to put forward, these documents should have been released. They, at the very least, provided impeachment evidence because some of their findings contrasted with the 2014 threat assessment used as the basis for planning the impound operation, and they undermined the prosecution’s opening statement.” 

There is more, but in all instances the appeals court affirmed the lower court’s decision. 

There are still many questions concerning the design, implementation and costs of this government boondoggle. Shamefully, neither political party has seen fit to conduct a complete investigation and report on this operation. That failure increases the odds that similar abuses will occur in the future.  

Until next time, be a nuisance to the devil and don’t forget to check that cinch.

Frank DuBois was the NM Secretary of Agriculture from 1988 to 2003, is the author of a blog: The Westerner (www.thewesterner.blogspot.com) and is the founder of The DuBois Rodeo Scholarship and The DuBois Western Heritage Foundation

This column originally appeared in the September issues of The New Mexico Stockman and The Livestock Market Digest. 

Now look at the post below: its only been a few months since federal troops were sent to various big cities, and we already have a GAO report on their activity. No such report has ever been requested concerning the Bundy Standoff. Any one of the 535 members of congress could make such a request, but they haven't. Careful scrutiny for social justice, nada for range justice. 

Idaho wraps up chaotic special session; Bundy arrested again

The Idaho Legislature on Wednesday wrapped up a chaotic, three-day special session by passing coronavirus-related legislation while anti-government activist Ammon Bundy was arrested for the second day in a row at the Statehouse. Lawmakers on the last day of the session called by Republican Gov. Brad Little approved legislation intended to smooth the counting of what is expected to be a surge of absentee ballots for the November election. Lawmakers in both the House and Senate also approved and sent to the governor legislation intended to shield businesses, schools and government entities from lawsuits if someone catches COVID-19. On Monday, angry protesters not wearing masks forced their way into the Idaho House gallery that had limited seating because of the coronavirus pandemic, the window of a glass door shattering as protesters jostled with police. There were no arrests. On Tuesday, more than 100 protesters shouted down and forced from the room lawmakers on a committee considering the liability-shield bill. Bundy was arrested for trespassing when he wouldn’t leave the room. Two others were arrested at the same time for the same reason. Bundy returned to the Statehouse on Wednesday despite a year-long ban after the trespassing arrest. Idaho State Police quickly arrested him a second time and removed him from the Senate gallery. Protests calmed following the arrests, which coincided with a much larger police presence in the Statehouse. The 44-year-old Bundy led the 2016 occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon as a show of support for state rights, planning to dissolve the federally-managed refuge. He and others were ultimately arrested, ending the 41-day occupation. But he was acquitted of all federal charges by an Oregon jury. The Idaho liability legislation he viewed as an unnecessary intrusion by the state caused by a hoax pandemic. Bundy is a supporter of Black Lives Matter, and he supports defunding police to limit what he said has become a police state...MORE

Aamon Bundy arrested at Idaho Statehouse

Authorities on Tuesday arrested anti-government activist Ammon Bundy at the Idaho Statehouse after he refused to leave a meeting room where a few hours earlier angry protesters forced out lawmakers. Bundy didn't respond to a reporter's shouted questions as he was wheeled into an elevator in a chair he apparently refused to get out of. At least two others were also arrested after police cleared the room, and they also refused to follow police commands to leave. Another person was taken into custody earlier in the same room where protesters shouted down lawmakers. The incident follows another on Monday when angry protesters forced their way into the Idaho House gallery that had limited seating because of the coronavirus pandemic, the window of a glass door getting shattered as protesters jostled with police. Protesters were ultimately let in when Republican House Speaker Scott Bedke stepped in, seeking to avoid violence. Lawmakers are meeting in a special session called by Republican Gov. Brad Little because of the coronavirus pandemic. Bundy and other protesters are opposed to a proposed liability law intended to shield schools, businesses and government entities from lawsuits from people who get COVID-19. Some lawmakers also oppose the legislation they say will remove accountability. The committee considering that legislation left the meeting room as at least a dozen Idaho State Police formed a shield between them and the crowd of more than 100...MORE

Government Misconduct Frees Cliven Bundy (9th Circuit affirms dismissal)

Dan McLaughlin

Politically charged prosecutions — even ones that are thoroughly justified — often end badly for the justice system. So it appears with the federal prosecutions of Cliven Bundy and his sons. The government blew its case against Bundy’s sons by overcharging them, resulting in a jury acquittal in 2016. Today, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of Bundy’s own federal indictment (as well as that of several of his co-defendants) on the grounds that the government had waited until the middle of trial to disclose information that would have helped Bundy’s case, in violation of Brady v. Maryland. The misconduct was so severe and prejudicial to the Bundy clan’s case that the court barred the government from bringing the same charges again. The opinion was written by Jay Bybee, a George W. Bush appointee, but joined by judges appointed by Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

The Bundy indictment charged extortion, threats to federal officers, and a variety of related crimes due to the armed standoff around the Bundy ranch arising from a longstanding dispute over unpaid grazing fees claimed by the Bureau of Land Management. The trial court rejected the Bundy clan’s self-defense theory, but, as the court wrote, “A central pillar of the government’s case was the allegation that the defendants recruited armed followers by intentionally deceiving those followers into believing that the Bundys feared for their lives because government snipers surrounded their ranch,” a charge that was touted in the government’s opening statement to the jury.

The Bundys asked for video shot by a camera they said the FBI had trained on them; the government called it a “fantastical fishing expedition,” but the camera’s existence and its live feed to the BLM command center was confirmed four days into the trial. The resulting hearing disclosed as well federal patrols “armed with AR-15 rifles” around the compound. The trial court gave the prosecution the benefit of the doubt that withholding this information was a good-faith decision, but several days later, more FBI interviews (form 302s) were disclosed discussing agents in full tactical gear watching the compound and the insertion of agents the FBI itself described as “snipers.” This only came to light after the trial judge had excluded evidence based on the government’s repeated insistence that there were no snipers. The Ninth Circuit summarized why withholding this evidence was so harmful to the Bundys’ ability to present a defense:

The defendants claim that the Bundys feared they were surrounded by heavily armed snipers. Keeping the defense from gathering as much evidence as possible to show that there was a reasonable basis to fear that snipers surrounded the property was itself harmful. Moreover, the Felix 302 actually refers to the BLM agent in the overwatch position as a “sniper.” Indeed, the Felix 302 uses both “tactical over watch position” and “sniper” to refer to the same agent. This was tangible documentation showing that the government’s own officials understood agents in overwatch positions to be equivalent to “snipers.” Even if the defendants had some other evidence of agents taking “overwatch” positions around the Bundy property, the Felix 302 supported their theory in ways that [documents provided earlier] did not. The Felix 302, therefore, adds credibility to the Bundys’ claims that they feared the presence of “snipers” and it should have been disclosed prior to trial. In sum, like the evidence regarding the camera, these documents could have helped the defense show that the defendants genuinely feared the presence of snipers—contradicting the allegations that the defendants intentionally lied about being surrounded by snipers to inflame supporters.

In the Ninth Circuit’s view, it was “preposterous and reckless” for the government to withhold this evidence:

Of particular concern is the government’s handling of evidence related to the presence of snipers. This was a hot-button issue. The term is evocative, rhetorically charged, and would have been a dog whistle for summoning members of private militias in ways that screaming “surveillance cameras!” would not. The government said the Bundys’ claim of “snipers” was “false” and “deceitful,” yet the government’s own documents referred to its agents as “snipers.” The government disputed the relevance of this information, fixating on the question of whether the officers in the “overwatch” were technically “snipers.” The district court had to remind the government that these were questions for the jury. 

The failure to produce evidence regarding “snipers” was particularly troubling for the district court because, during the Tier 3 trial of other co-defendants, the district court prohibited testimony regarding the presence of snipers, based on the government’s assurances that there were no snipers involved in the impound operation. The district court even removed a testifying defendant from the stand in that trial because the defendant kept stating that snipers were present. The district court was understandably exasperated when evidence came to light in this trial, showing that the government referred to its agents as “snipers.”

In short, the government had to know the import that any evidence regarding snipers, or agents who looked and functioned like snipers, would have in this case. Nevertheless, it withheld a slate of information bolstering the claim that the defendants could have had a reasonable basis for believing there were snipers in the area.

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Ammon Bundy Comes Out in Support of BLM, Calls to Defund the Police

Ammon Bundy, an anti-government activist who lead the 41-day armed takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge back in 2016, expressed support for the Black Lives Matter movement and for defunding the police in a recent Facebook video.  He said in the video that he had considered attending, near his home in Boise, Idaho, “a rally with the Black Lives Matter in support of defunding the police because yes the police need to be defunded.” He decided not to attend the rally, citing concerns about potential violence from fellow “Patriots” who have criticized his stance on the issue. Anyone who doesn’t understand his support for the movement “must have a problem,” he said. “You must have a problem in your mind if you think that somehow the Black Lives Matter is more dangerous than the police,” he said. “You must have a problem in your mind if you think that Antifa is the one going to take your freedom.”...Bundy went on to blame Conservative talk show hosts for adding a negative connotation to certain key phrases like “defund the police,” which he called “the right thing to do” as police have become “a huge authoritarian bureaucracy” that will “take way our liberty.” 8 He criticized his followers for supporting law enforcement and the military “even when they’re doing terrible things across the world.” “I’m not saying that everything they’re doing and every person in it — don’t get me wrong – are doing that, but there needs to be a defunding of government in general, and especially the police forces because they’re the ones who are actually going to seek and destroy us.”...MORE

Bundy's trenches may force confrontation with BLM

Jennifer Yachnin

The Bureau of Land Management is investigating whether Nevada rancher Ryan Bundy illegally built new irrigation infrastructure across Gold Butte National Monument, the same area where his family unlawfully grazes cattle on public lands. A BLM official declined to comment on the allegations to E&E News but wrote emails to two individuals familiar with the situation that it is "under investigation" as of last week. In an email to E&E News, Ryan Bundy said he was unaware of BLM's inquiry into his irrigation efforts. A group of local hikers who visited the 300,000-acre monument in southeastern Nevada in mid-April first reported the incident to BLM. The four-page complaint, a copy of which was provided to E&E News, includes GPS coordinates of new irrigation trenches, as well as photos of equipment used to lay irrigation pipe, including a tractor...One of the individuals who filed the complaint spoke with E&E News on the condition of anonymity. The individual said that the hikers crossed paths with Ryan Bundy as he drove a flatbed truck carrying several reels of sprinkler line used for irrigation projects. The missive concludes with a suggestion that Bundy is likely using the system for additional cattle watering troughs in the area and will increase the number of livestock that the Bundy clan illegally grazes in the region...All three Bundys and Montana resident Ryan Payne faced trial in the U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada on those charges in 2017, but the case resulted in a mistrial after Chief Judge Gloria Navarro found that the government had withheld key information from defendants. The Justice Department is seeking a new trial for the Bundys and Payne. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is set to hear arguments in that case on May 29 in San Francisco...MORE

Perspectives: Challenging the narrative of what happened to LaVoy Finicum and others in Oregon

Bryan Hyde

Every time I get thinking that I know the full stories behind what happened at the Malheur wildlife refuge in Oregon in 2016, I’m reminded that there’s still a lot I didn’t know. For instance, this past weekend, I had the chance to attend the screening of the second part of a fascinating documentary called “LaVoy – Dead Man Talking”. The film is part of a series produced by the Center for Self Governance. It’s a remarkable documentary that outlines the process by which Ammon and Ryan Bundy, along with LaVoy Finicum and others, chose to occupy the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon. What makes it a highly valuable source of information is that the film uses the actual words of the key players themselves rather than a commentator’s interpretation of what they may have said. Much of the footage consists of YouTube videos recorded by LaVoy himself as well as undercover audio recordings made by law enforcement informants who infiltrated the public meetings leading up to the occupation. There’s a great deal that a person can learn from going directly to the source rather than relying on incomplete and sometimes distorted reporting from others...MORE

Feds, state and Harney County officials urge judge to dismiss wrongful death lawsuit filed by widow of Robert ‘LaVoy’ Finicum

A string of lawyers representing the FBI, the state and Harney County officials all urged a judge Friday to dismiss a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the estate of Robert “LaVoy’’ Finicum, the spokesman of the 2016 armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon. They argued that the suit contains broad and vague allegations and that the widow’s lawyer neglected to properly serve notice to several of the defendants...The lawsuit claims Finicum was shot "assassination style'' by "one or more militarized officers of the Oregon State Police and/or FBI'' as he was trying to leave Harney County on Jan. 26, 2016, during the refuge takeover. It contends the defendants engaged in "widespread and systemic corruption'' and the "premeditated targeting'' of Finicum because of his association with Cliven Bundy and his family, Finicum’s membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Finicum’s political views and activism critical of federal land management and the BLM. Attorney J. Morgan Philpot, who represents Jeanette Finicum, said the plaintiffs have evidence of an “animus that was carried over between two friends who worked together since 2009,’’ referring to Love and Bretzing. Bretzing had served as an assistant agent-in-charge of the FBI’s Salt Lake City office from 2007 through 2012, when Love worked in Utah for the BLM. Love was the agent in charge of the federal roundup of Cliven Bundy’s cows in Bunkerville, Nevada, in 2014, over unpaid grazing fees. Philpot briefly mentioned a statement made by a BLM whistleblower Larry Wooten, who told federal investigators that his supervisors at the land bureau in Nevada appeared to be “personally offended’’ by the Bundys. “The office narrative that evolved was that there needs to be an officer involved shooting to make these types of people get the message,’’ the statement read, according to papers filed in the Cliven Bundy case in Nevada. The government is appealing the dismissal of charges against Cliven Bundy in Nevada, a case pending before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals...MORE

Republican state Rep. is accused of domestic terrorism for planning the 41-day Bundy showdown in Oregon

An independent investigation commissioned by the Washington State House of Representatives has alleged that a Republican rep. for the state engaged in acts of domestic terrorism against the US for his part working with the Bundy family militia. The Rampart Group LLC private investigation firm released a 108-pg report detailing how Representative Matt Shea 'planned, engaged in and promoted a total of three armed conflicts of political violence against the United States Government' as a leader of the Patriot Movement. Shea was found to have had a hand in three events: a 2014 standoff in Bunkerville, Nevada, that involved 1500 armed militia members; a 2015 armed conflict in Priest River, Idaho, against the Veteran Administration; and the 2016 armed takeover at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Burns, Oregon, that led to the death of one person. 'In one conflict Representative Shea led cover strategic pre-planning in advance of the conflict,' the report states of Shea's participation in the Oregon incident, which lasted for 41 days 'resulting in devastating, financial, physical and emotional harm to a community and its residents; and the loss of one life.' The report states that Shea communicated with Ammon Bundy and other militia members 'in the planning' of the takeover from November 2015 through January 2, 2016. Shea - who was first elected in 2008 - was said to have released a press release calling for militia to help support the action in Oregon. He was also said to have created a detailed operation plan on January 3 of that year - called 'Operation Cold Reality' - that gave clear explanations as to what leadership was to do during the armed occupation at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. On January 4, 2016, Shea used an encrypted email and the code name 'Verumbellator' to contact state reps. from Washington, Idaho and Nevada - along with Coalition of Western States militia leaders - to give them instructions for the takeover. Not identifying himself as a member of COWS, Shea traveled to Burns, Oregon, and met with law enforcement that was dealing with Ammon Bundy and the armed occupiers,' the report states. He was said to have 'gathered intelligence to counter law enforcement operations.'...MORE

U.S. Forest Service Hit with Lawsuit Over Cattle Grazing Permits

Do we have another Bundy 2.0 case on our hands? Environmental groups seem to think so if a recent lawsuit is any indication. Western Watersheds Project (WWP) filed litigation against the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) in the U.S. District Court District of Utah on Nov. 20. The complaint claims USFS has been influenced by “threats made by a handful of scofflaw grazing permittees on Monroe Mountain” to allow “excessive stocking rates, repeated trespass and non-compliance with federal regulations,” according to a released statement. The lawsuit asserts USFS “continues to authorize grazing at levels that repeatedly lead to over-utilization of forage vegetation and degradation of other forest resources” and alleges the agency uses prescribed burns in an effort to stimulate regrowth as opposed to removing cattle. “When the Forest Service tried to do the right thing and suspend these livestock grazing permits for multiple willful violations of the terms and conditions, the ranchers responded with threats of violence,” said John Persell, staff attorney with WWP. The lawsuit further asserts livestock grazing permittees have been “stoked by the anti-government rhetoric of Cliven Bundy and other fringe extremists.” WWP claims, “USFS has bent and broken its own laws and regulations, and continues to authorize livestock grazing without any reasonable expectation of permit compliance.” The lawsuit against USFS comes as the result of a WWP member visiting the Kingston, Forshea, and Manning Creek grazing allotments in October 2019. The employee said she witnessed trespassing cattle more than a week after the permitted off-dates, permit and annual operating instructions (AOI) violations, and environmental damage. The damage included over-utilization of forage, unmaintained fences, and degraded natural water features. WWP said several ranchers were issued notices of non-compliance in 2013 for forage over-utilization, further livestock use after the permitted off date, and pasture rotation schedules not followed. According to the complaint document, after USFS cited “safety concerns and verbal threats” from the parties following the drafting of 50 percent suspension letters, USFS did not send finalized suspension letters. The document further reads that in 2014, the ranching parties requested the allotments be managed through deferred-rotation instead of rest-rotation, and USFS accepted the requests even though the process was not authorized under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The suit also said the parties did not follow the rotation schedule outlined in the AOIs, and range improvements were not maintained to standard...MORE

You can view the 57-page complaint here. 

How the strange tale of the "Oregon standoff" explains what happened in America in 2016

Andrew O'Hehir

Anthony McCann's "Shadowlands: Fear and Freedom at the Oregon Standoff" is one of those extraordinary books that seems to be about one thing, and turns out to be about almost everything. I raved to people a lot while I was reading it, drawing unwise comparisons to "Moby-Dick" and "Beyond Good and Evil." I'm still somewhat OK with those analogies. But rather than going deep on the lit-crit, I would more soberly suggest that "Shadowlands" belongs on the shelf beside Peter Matthiessen's "In the Spirit of Crazy Horse" or Edward Abbey's "Desert Solitaire," as a work of political nonfiction that isn't really "political," at least not in the narrow, normative use of that word. McCann is a poet and writing teacher who lives in the Mojave Desert of Southern California, and was drawn into the now-half-forgotten story of the 2016 "Oregon standoff" by his interest in the geography of the West, Native American messianic spirituality and the way those things intersect with the uniquely American theology of the Latter-day Saints. (Who have officially requested that we no longer call them the Mormons: Everybody gets a safe space.) I want to let my fascinating conversation with McCann tell most of the story, but let's just say that whatever you think you know about the Oregon standoff — when a handful of libertarian loons, associated with the notorious Bundy family of Nevada and drawn together by the internet, took over the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in the remote desert of southeastern Oregon — is probably wrong. The Malheur occupiers relied on a thoroughly nutty interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, and most of them came from the fringes of the far right. But they weren't white supremacists, mostly weren't gun-totin' militia types (except for a few hangers-on), and never resorted to violence or even seriously threatened to do so. ou don't have to agree with anything about the occupiers' understanding of America or God or freedom — and McCann certainly doesn't — to agree that they were responding to something real: a notionally democratic state that has lost much of its popular legitimacy, and a civil society that often feels unmoored or uprooted. Something else, of course, also happened in 2016, and McCann's book becomes an inadvertent chronicle of the weird stew of discontent, on social media and IRL, that led to the election of our current president...MORE

A Creepy Look Inside Ammon Bundy’s Oregon Occupation

As December wore on, more denizens of Ammon’s and Ryan’s patriot’s FaceWorld were trickling into the county. Some of these folks were of considerably different temperament than mild-mannered Ammon. Jon Ritzheimer was one of the more widely known and more troubling of these newcomers. Before coming to Burns, the young Iraq War veteran had ended up on the national news for leading an armed protest outside a Muslim community center in his home state of Arizona. At the rally he’d sported a fuck islam shirt, the principal product of his online business, Rogue Infidel. In the coming months he’d recant on the shirts and claim, in emotional videos posted to the internet, to regret the whole thing. It wasn’t that he’d mellowed, exactly; around the same time he’d also been making threats to personally arrest a Michigan senator who’d supported the Iran nuclear deal, an act he promised to follow up with more arrests, including a citizen’s arrest of the president if necessary...MORE

Creepy is right. Not sure it is worth your time. It is an excerpt from McCann's book.