MENTALITY WHO IS THIS CLIVEN BUNDY AND WHY ARE ‘PATRIOTS’ LINING UP BEHIND HIM? by William albright
A
lthough no shots were fired, some pundits are calling the recent standoff between the Bureau of Land Management and supporters of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy “The Battle of Bunkerville” after a town near the confrontation. On April 5, federal agents and hired cowboys began rounding up Bundy’s cattle. According to the BLM, Bundy owes more than $1 million in back grazing fees and fines going back to 1993. The 68-year-old rancher has refused to pay the fees—which he puts at $300,000—because his Mormon family settled in the area in 1877, which predates the creation of the BLM (though it followed both the birth of the state and the Emancipation Proclamation). He contends that the land is his and that the agency and the OPINION
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federal government have no authority over him. Bundy has tested his claim in numerous court cases and has lost every one. So, after 20 years of discussion, the BLM issued a notice it would impound Bundy’s cattle and proceeded to do so. Many of Bundy’s large family—he has about 70 children and grandchildren—and supporters gathered at his ranch near Bunkerville to resist the roundup. Over the next few days, some family members were roughed up in skirmishes with federal agents. On April 9, one of them was tasered after he kicked a police dog. The incident was captured on video which went viral after being posted on the internet. A protest camp was formed the next day and right-wing militiamen and Tea Party activists flooded in by the hundreds, many of them armed and dressed in combat gear. “It’s not about cows,” said Bundy relative Jack Faught. “It’s about the freedom to make our “a own choices close to home.” One protestor told mENtalitY” Fox News his militia group was planning to put women in the continued on front lines if violence page 14
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MAY 1, 2014
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