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With the public already steaming over the increasingly lawless and out-of-control federal government, top Texas officials on both sides of the aisle were quick to react after recent reports suggested the Obama administration’s Bureau of Land Management was plotting yet another unconstitutional land grab. This time, the BLM is reportedly eying some 90,000 acres along the Red River on the Texas-Oklahoma border. From the governor’s office to the attorney general to the legislature, however, the message from Texans was loud and clear: “Don’t Mess With Texas.”Already facing nationwide outrage and criticism over its extreme tactics at the Bundy ranch in...

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, issued the following letter April 24 to the Bureau of Land Management asking the agency to respond to concerns raised by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott about the Red River Boundary Compact and associated lands. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ The Honorable Neil Kornze Director Bureau of Land Management United States Department of the Interior 1849 C Street NW, Room 5665 Washington, DC 20240 Dear Director Kornze, In a letter dated April 22nd, 2014, the Attorney General of Texas Greg Abbott asked for responses to five specific inquiries regarding Bureau of Land Management land claims along the Red River....

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Oklahoma Field Office responded to Breitbart Texas about the so-called Red River “land grab” by emphasizing that parcels in question are already held in the public domain and BLM-managed. The Bureau claims it is not they who are declaring the ownership but that settled case law long declared it to be government land. BLM Public Relations Specialist Paul McGuire agreed to a one-on-one telephone interview with Breitbart Texas after reading the original report published earlier this week. In contrast with the interview with Texas General Land Office Commissioner Jerry Patterson, McGuire expressed much...

Most all major news outlets in America, if they even cover it, have couched the disturbance between the Bureau of Land Management and Cliven Bundy as one based on the Bundy Ranch refusing to pay for grazing rights on Federal property. Yet, a similar incident between the U.S. Forest Service and Kit Laney in New Mexico, in which the Forest Service claims part of the Laney Ranch is on Federal property, has the same basic principle at stake and it has nothing to do with grazing rights or boundary disputes. Those issues are moot points if we answer a more...

In a statement posted on the U.S. Bureau of Land Management website (BLM), federal officials denied any expansion of holdings along the Red River after Breitbart Texas brought the matter to national attention. The nuanced denial has drawn critical reactions from a number of elected Texas officials. BLM spokesman Paul McGuire said “The 140-acres in question were determined to be public land in 1986 when the U.S. District Court ruled on a case brought by two private landowners, each seeking to adjust boundary lines for their respective properties. The BLM was not a party to any litigation between landowners. The...

Texas officials are raising alarm that the Bureau of Land Management, on the heels of its dust-up with Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, might be eyeing a massive land grab in northern Texas. The under-the-radar issue has caught the attention of Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, who fired off a letter on Tuesday to BLM Director Neil Kornze saying the agency “appears to be threatening” the private property rights of “hard-working Texans.” “Decisions of this magnitude must not be made inside a bureaucratic black box,” wrote Abbott, also a Republican gubernatorial candidate. At issue are thousands of acres of land on...

Cliven Bundy marched into my life one Friday morning in January 1992 in a protest bound for a federal courthouse in Las Vegas. He held up one side of a street-width banner that asked, “Has the West been won or has the fight just begun?” To my great relief, just as Bundy promised, nearly 200 ranchers from all over the state marched behind him, yelling “Property rights!” Nearly a mile later, the marchers fell silent and filed into the courtroom where Wayne Hage of Pine Creek Ranch faced arraignment for the felony of cleaning brush out of his ditches without...

Andy Barrie recently held a property rights seminar for landowners. Asked what lessons they shared, Ceil Barrie said with teary eyes, "Yeah, don't annoy the government."

War on the West: Why More Bundy Standoffs Are Coming 15 April 2014 The recent standoff between the BLM and rancher Cliven Bundy is a symptom of the exasperation of citizens in the Western states over the federal government's massive and oppressive footprint affecting all aspects of their lives.... Full Story:http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/item/18056-war-on-the-west-why-more-bundy-standoffs-are-coming

According to Mack, the so-called retreat was nothing more than theatrics. “It was a ploy to get people to back off, to get people out of the way. They weren’t expecting us to get this amount of people here. They were surprised by the numbers and so they wanted a way to get us out of here. This was a ploy to get us out of here and then they’re going after the Bundys.” Mack said that when he was at the Bundy ranch on Saturday there were an estimated 600 to 800 protesters present when federal agents were releasing...

The Bureau of Land Management announced Saturday that it has concluded its mission to remove illegal cattle from a rural Nevada range after a tense week-long standoff with a rancher and militia supporters. "Based on information about conditions on the ground, and in consultation with law enforcement, we have made a decision to conclude the cattle gather because of our serious concern about the safety of employees and members of the public," the statement read. Bureau officials had dismantled designated protest areas supporting rancher Cliven Bundy, who they say refuses to comply with the "same laws that 16,000 public land...

UPDATE: Armed Bundy family leaders meet with BLM officers Posted: Apr 12, 2014 3:06 PM EDT Updated: Apr 12, 2014 4:05 PM EDT By Caroline Bleakley, Senior Online Editor - LAS VEGAS --  Armed Bundy family leaders are meeting with BLM officers to discuss what will become of the cattle that the feds removed from BLM land, over the past week.Tensions are running high and I-15 is closed in both directions, about seven miles south of Mesquite, because protesters have blocked the freeway, according to Nevada Highway Patrol.The protesters have gathered in support of rancher Cliven Bundy, who has been locked...

Deal reached; BLM will release confiscated cattle to rancher Posted: Apr 12, 2014 3:06 PM EDT Updated: Apr 12, 2014 4:57 PM EDT By Caroline Bleakley, Senior Online Editor LAS VEGAS --  A deal has been reached between Bundy family leaders and the BLM, but not without some very tense moments.Armed Bundy family leaders met with BLM officers Saturday afternoon in Mesquite to discuss the fate of the Bundy's cattle that the feds removed from BLM land, over the past week. The cattle are being held at a holding area in Mesquite.Prior to the meeting, hundreds of protesters, some armed, tried...

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management announced today that it was ending its effort to seize Cliven Bundy’s herd of cattle that has been illegally grazing on federal land. The reason the BLM suspended the cattle round up was to protect the safety of federal employees and members of the general public. Bundy and a smattering of his right-wing supporters have threatened to wage a range war if the government continues with its effort to enforce the law. Let that sink in for a minute. The government is halting their efforts to enforce the law because of the threats being...

It’s been protected from meddlesome hikers by the threat of prison time. But the pampered desert dweller now faces a threat from the very people who have nurtured it as BLM closes Vegas rescue center. LAS VEGAS — For decades, the vulnerable desert tortoise has led a sheltered existence. Developers have taken pains to keep the animal safe. It’s been protected from meddlesome hikers by the threat of prison time. And wildlife officials have set the species up on a sprawling conservation reserve outside Las Vegas. But the pampered desert dweller now faces a threat from the very people who...

By now you’re familiar with the standoff between the federal government, i.e. the Bureau of Land Management, and 67 year-old rancher Cliven Bundy. .. The BLM asserts their power through the expressed desire to protect the endangered desert tortoise, a tortoise so “endangered” that their population can no longer be contained by the refuge constructed for them so the government is closing it and euthanizing over a thousand tortoises. The tortoises, the excuse that BLM has given for violating claims to easements and running all but one lone rancher out of southern Nevada, is doing fine. In fact, the tortoise...

They’re almost like a hired gun’. Armed Rangers were brought in from out of state by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to assist in security surrounding the Bundy Ranch, according to the family. A heated confrontation on Wednesday resulted in Cliven Bundy’s son Ammon being tasered by BLM officials and a 57-year-old protester being shoved to the ground. Stetsy Bundy Cox, Cliven’s daughter, told the Washington Free Beacon that some of the rangers had Oregon and California license plates. “You know, some of these guys don’t even know why they’re here,” she said. “A few people have talked to...

Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy’s decades-long battle against the federal government over grazing rights has heated to the point where militia groups have joined in and taken up spots against the feds who’ve circled his land — and talk is, they’re not afraid to open fire. A spokesman for the one of the militia groups said as much to local 8 News Now: I’m not “afraid to shoot,” he said. Margaret Houston, Mr. Bundy’s sister and a cancer survivor, said at a town hall gathering this week that the situation “was like a war zone” and that she felt “like I...

In what critics are describing as a government land grab, the Environmental Protection Agency proposed a change Tuesday to the Clean Water Act that would give it regulatory authority over temporary wetlands and waterways. The proposal immediately sparked concerns that the regulatory power could extend into seasonal ponds, streams and ditches, including those on private property. "The ... rule may be one of the most significant private property grabs in U.S. history," said Louisiana Sen. David Vitter, the top Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. The EPA proposal would apply pollution regulations to the country's so-called "intermittent...

Why is the EPA altering state boundaries in Wyoming - and reversing over 100 years of established law? Well, apparently the city of Riverton now falls under the jurisdiction of the Wind River Indian Reservation. This, obviously, isn't sitting well with the governor's office - which is urging the EPA to reconsider its ruling and respect the rule of law. Reacting to the decision to reduce the size of Wyoming by about a million acres, Wyoming Governor Matt Mead warned of the dangers to all Americans of this type of unilateral land redistribution by the EPA: "I understand that the...