Cliven Bundy

Cliven D. Bundy (born April 29, 1946) 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.

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.

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.

According to The Guardian, Bundy told his supporters that "We definitely don't recognize [the BLM director's] jurisdiction or authority, his arresting power or policing power in any way," and in interviews he used the language of the sovereign citizen movement, thereby gaining the support of members of the Oath Keepers, the White Mountain Militia and the Praetorian Guard militias.

The movement is considered by the FBI as a major domestic terrorism threat.

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.

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.

Bundy initiated the 2014 Bundy standoff in Nevada, an armed standoff with federal and state law enforcement over defaulted grazing fees.

He was placed in federal custody, facing federal charges related to his own standoff with the Bureau of Land Management in 2014.

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.

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.

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 (BLM) and Cliven Bundy over unpaid grazing fees on federally owned land in southeastern Nevada.

On March 27, 2014, 145604 acre acres 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.

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.

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."

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.

On February 10, 2016, Cliven Bundy was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) at the Portland International Airport while he was on his way to support the Malheur Standoff.

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, (which opposes federal government involvement in favor of state and local governments) and the sovereign citizen movement (which holds that people are answerable only to their particular interpretation of the common law and are not subject to any government statutes or proceedings).

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.