Defiant Nevada rancher faces armed federal agents in escalating confiscation standoff
A long-simmering dispute between a Nevada cattle rancher and the federal Bureau of Land Management has reached a boiling point, and participants have their fingers crossed it won’t erupt into violence.
Since 1993, Cliven Bundy has been battling the agency, as well as the National Park Service, the Center for Biological Diversity and the courts, to graze his cattle on 150 square miles of Gold Butte scrub land in the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. He stopped paying his grazing fees back then, saying he “fired” the Bureau of Land Management as land manager. His Mormon ancestors had tilled the unforgiving soil since 1887, long before the 1934 Taylor Grazing Act allowed the federal government to seize control, TheBlaze reported.
“I have raised cattle on that land, which is public land for the people of Clark County, all my life. Why I raise cattle there and why I can raise cattle there is because I have preemptive rights,” he asserted, explaining to TheBlaze that this includes the right to forage, too.
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Defiant Nevada rancher faces armed federal agents in escalating confiscation standoff - BizPac Review
A long-simmering dispute between a Nevada cattle rancher and the federal Bureau of Land Management has reached a boiling point, and participants have their fingers crossed it won’t erupt into violence.
Since 1993, Cliven Bundy has been battling the agency, as well as the National Park Service, the Center for Biological Diversity and the courts, to graze his cattle on 150 square miles of Gold Butte scrub land in the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. He stopped paying his grazing fees back then, saying he “fired” the Bureau of Land Management as land manager. His Mormon ancestors had tilled the unforgiving soil since 1887, long before the 1934 Taylor Grazing Act allowed the federal government to seize control, TheBlaze reported.
“I have raised cattle on that land, which is public land for the people of Clark County, all my life. Why I raise cattle there and why I can raise cattle there is because I have preemptive rights,” he asserted, explaining to TheBlaze that this includes the right to forage, too.
more
Defiant Nevada rancher faces armed federal agents in escalating confiscation standoff - BizPac Review