Senator Reid won his seat in the Senate, way back then, because the GOP candidate wasn't good enough. The libertarian candidate syphoned enough votes away from the GOPer and Reid got elected.
And again more recently, it looked as if Reid would lose his re-election but the right wing kooks didn't think GOP candidate was good enough so the nominated Sharon Angle who lost to Reid.
Sharon Angle's most prominent supporter was Mama Griz, so you could say that Sarah Palin got what she deserved.
Anyway, back to the original story, apparently, all we now have is another nutjob conspiracy theory. The land in question is land owned by the county, not the BLM.
The whole country, in fact the entire free world, is living with the result of an uninformed electorate.