Cliven Bundy
Cliven D. Bundy is an American cattle rancher known for his role in the 2014 Bundy standoff. Bundy has advocated a philosophy opposed to what he views as federal government overreach. He is the father of Ammon Bundy, who in 2016 also led another armed standoff against the government, the occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon.
Bundy initiated the 2014 Bundy standoff in Nevada, an armed standoff with federal and state law enforcement over defaulted grazing fees. On February 10, 2016, Cliven Bundy was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation at the Portland International Airport while he was on his way to support the Occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. He was placed in federal custody, facing federal charges related to his own standoff with the Bureau of Land Management in 2014. On January 8, 2018, Judge Gloria Navarro declared a mistrial and dismissed the charges because the federal government had withheld potentially exculpatory evidence.
Bundy has participated in, and had links with various related movements, including anti-government activism and the sovereign citizen movement. Some view him as a hero for having led a movement of ranchers to encourage more ranchers to join him in defaulting on their grazing fees as per their federal grazing contracts. Bundy's views have also generated significant controversy and criticism; for instance, he came under fire for remarks suggesting that African Americans might have been better off under slavery.
Early life
Bundy was born on April 29, 1946, in Las Vegas, to David Ammon Bundy and Bodel Jensen Bundy. His father started grazing cattle on an allotment near the farm in Bunkerville, Nevada that he purchased in 1949 while his mother had settled on land near Mesquite, Nevada.Worldview
Bundy advocated for limited federal government involvement in local affairs, particularly in ranching.Bundy supported the ideas of the sovereign citizen movement. Many of the adherents of the movement argue that the federal government is illegitimate and does not have jurisdiction over individuals, meaning that laws do not apply to them. Bundy had asked for the support of members of the Oath Keepers, the White Mountain Militia, and the Praetorian Guard.
Cliven Bundy has said he does not recognize federal police power over land that he believes belongs to the "sovereign state of Nevada."
Bundy has denied the jurisdiction of the federal court system over Nevada land and filed an unsuccessful motion to dismiss the Bureau of Land Management case against him by claiming the federal courts have no jurisdiction because he is a "citizen of Nevada, not the territory of Nevada". Bundy also believes that federally owned land in Nevada actually belongs to the state.
J. J. MacNab, who writes for Forbes about anti-government extremism, described Bundy's views as having been inspired by the sovereign citizen movement, whose adherents claim that the county sheriff is the most powerful law-enforcement officer in the country, with authority superior to that of any federal agent, local law-enforcement agency or any other elected official. According to The Guardian, Bundy told his supporters that "We definitely don't recognize jurisdiction or authority, his arresting power or policing power in any way," and in interviews he used the sovereign citizen language, thereby gaining the support of members of the Oath Keepers, the White Mountain Militia and the Praetorian Guard militias. The sovereign citizen movement is considered by the FBI as a major domestic terrorism threat.
On April 12, 2014, Bundy demanded Clark County Sheriff Doug Gillespie to confront the federal agents, disarm them and deliver their arms to Bundy within an hour of his demand, and later expressed disappointment that Gillespie did not comply.
The Southern Poverty Law Center has described Bundy's views as closely aligned with those of the Posse Comitatus organization, and it has also asserted that such self-described "patriot" groups were focused on secession, nullification, and the principles of the Tenther movement.
In May 2014, Bundy changed his party affiliation from the Republican Party to the Independent American Party.
Religion
Bundy is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and has attributed the outcome of the standoff to divine intervention.Standoff
The Bundy standoff was an armed confrontation between protesters and law enforcement that developed from a 20-year legal dispute between the United States Bureau of Land Management and Cliven Bundy over unpaid grazing fees on federally owned land in southeastern Nevada.The dispute started in 1993, when, in protest against changes to grazing rules, Bundy declined to renew his permit for cattle grazing on BLM-administered lands near Bunkerville, Nevada. According to the Bureau of Land Management, Bundy continued to graze his cattle on public lands without a permit. In 1998, Bundy was prohibited by the United States District Court for the District of Nevada from grazing his cattle on an area of land later called the Bunkerville Allotment. In July 2013, U.S. District Judge Lloyd D. George ordered that Bundy refrain from trespassing on federally administered land in the Gold Butte area of Clark County.
On March 27, 2014, of federal land in Clark County were temporarily closed for the "capture, impound, and removal of trespass cattle". BLM officials and law enforcement rangers began a roundup of such livestock on April 5, and an arrest was made the next day. On April 12, a group of protesters, some of them armed, advanced on what the BLM described as a "cattle gather". Sheriff Doug Gillespie negotiated with Bundy and newly confirmed BLM director Neil Kornze, who elected to release the cattle and de-escalate the situation. As of the end of 2015, Bundy continued to graze his cattle on Federal land and had not paid the fees.
During an interview with a journalist following the standoff, Bundy cited Article 1, Section 8, Clause 17 of the Constitution to assert the federal government is limited to owning ten square miles of land, though the clause actually limits the District of Columbia to "ten Miles square."
Racist comments
About a week after the climax of the standoff, on April 19, 2014, Bundy spoke about witnessing a civil disturbance, the 1965 Watts riots. Bundy described his views about unhappiness at that time and criticized what he saw as government interference and its influence on African Americans. He recalled later seeing a public housing project in North Las Vegas where some of the older residents and the children sat on the porch. He said:A year later Bundy called the reaction to his statements a "misunderstanding," saying he was not racist and that he should not have used the term "Negro." He added: "I've never had a black person or a brown person ever say anything bad about me." He then proceeded to make further statements about race, comparing "welfare and housing" to slavery. He expressed support for Blacks who have "raised themselves up to a point where they are equal with the rest of us." As an alternative to government jobs and programs, he touted private-sector work. "We don't need leeches feeding off us and eating off of us," he said. "We need producers."
Response by public officials
Then Minority Leader Democratic U.S. Senator from Nevada, Harry Reid, condemned the Bundy statement and said Bundy had,"...revealed himself to be a hateful racist. But by denigrating people who work hard and play by the rules while he mooches off public land he also revealed himself to be a hypocrite... It is the height of irresponsibility for any individual or entity in a position of power or influence to glorify or romanticize such a dangerous individual... For their part, national Republican leaders could help show a united front against this kind of hateful, dangerous extremism by publicly condemning Bundy."
On April 23, 2014, Bundy defended his comments by saying "the statement was right".
A number of Republican politicians and talk-show hosts who previously had supported Bundy, forcefully condemned his remarks as racist, including then-U.S. Senator Dean Heller of Nevada, who previously had described Bundy defenders as "patriots", and U.S. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky. On April 23, 2014, Heller said through a spokesperson that he "completely disagrees with Mr. Bundy's appalling and racist statements, and condemns them in the most strenuous way".
Response by the media
, who had initially supported Bundy in his Fox News talk show, had interviewed Bundy several times, and had called him "a friend and frequent guest of the show", later said that Bundy's remarks were "beyond repugnant". Glenn Beck condemned Bundy's comments as "unhinged from reality" and urged his supporters to "end your relationship" with him.Writing for the Los Angeles Times, Patt Morrison saw the incident as one of many where an ordinary person is "turned into the poster boy or the poster girl of some political battle du jour." Morrison wrote, "It happens so often that Las Vegas may have a betting line, not on whether these folks will implode but when. The Cliven Bundys of American politics, bit players who are suddenly promoted to center stage, are never as good as their adherents want them to be. They are not empty vessels, but they are flawed ones."
Ben Swann questioned whether Bundy's "inarticulate" comments were given a "truthful representation", and published a video segment which includes the comments preceding and following the quotation published by Adam Nagourney of The New York Times.
Joseph Curl, writing for The Washington Times, described Bundy's views as incorrect and noted the New York Times had failed to print an entire transcript of the remarks.