Silke Jasso
President Obama’s Dec. 28 announcement granting federal protection to hundreds of thousands of acres in southern Utah and Nevada has injected new life into the armed militias and anti-government protesters who stood with the Bundy family in small uprisings in 2014 and earlier this year, according to Vocativ.
Videos by Rare
Posts in the Cliven Bundy’s Army! Facebook group contain calls to arms and summons to the Bundy ranch. Some supporters claim to be there already.
RELATED: A verdict has been reached in the case against Ammon Bundy and the Oregon wildlife refuge occupiers
They’ve directed their ire toward the designation of 300,000 acres in Nevada, which include Gold Butte and abut parts of the Bundy Ranch. Newly protected land includes the location of the 2014 standoff between Bureau of Land Management personnel and Cliven Bundy and his heavily-armed supporters from around the country.
President Obama’s announcement explicitly stated the purpose of protecting the land.
Today, I am designating two new national monuments in the desert landscapes of southeastern Utah and southern Nevada to protect some of our country’s most important cultural treasures, including abundant rock art, archaeological sites and lands considered sacred by Native American tribes.
In 2014, Cliven Bundy and his supporters took a stand against Bureau of Land Management agents who came to collect on the over $1 million Bundy owed in grazing fees. The agents came to impound and forcefully remove “trespass cattle” but backed down after one of their own was approached by gun-wielding men. Earlier this year, Cliven Bundy’s sons Ammon and Ryan infiltrated the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon to protest the federal government’s control of public lands.
Though Bundy’s sons have been cleared of charges in the Oregon incident, Cliven Bundy and more than a dozen others face charges for both standoffs.
