Timeline: Radical antigovernment right and federal land-use disputes https://t.co/6ZPhjn7DG3 #OregonStandoff pic.twitter.com/5XiHxWLytX
— SPLC (@splcenter) January 4, 2016
There’s still no telling what will come of the armed, self-styled “militiamen” who’ve taken over a few buildings in a remote Eastern Oregon wildlife refuge. The FBI is heading up the response, but so far authorities are being cautious.
The drama of unoccupied federal buildings falling into the hands of a pack of gun-toting dudes announcing vague plans and making spurious claims has now spurred coverage around the world—and obvious comparisons to a 2014 standoff in Nevada helmed by the same ranchers now spewing rhetoric in Harney County. But it’s worth noting Oregon’s seen less prominent action recently in the movement to push the federal government to cede its lands to state ownership.
Similar sentiments have been around for decades— just like clashes between federal officials Dwight and Steve Hammond, the Oregon ranchers whose impending imprisonment started all this.
In the last year alone, anger over federal land ownership has spurred action a couple different ways in Oregon. In April, members of a group called Oath Keepers converged on Medford to assist a pair of mine owners who said the feds were infringing on their rights. Like the Hammonds, those mine owners initially asked the “militia” members for help, before spurning their activities. The Oath Keepers—often current and former members of the armed services who say they’re defending the constitution in the face of government overreach—had begun phoning threats to employees of the US Bureau of Land Management (which is a worryingly common occurrence these days).
Notions of “reclaiming” federal lands have popped up in more mainstream ways, too. During last year’s legislative session, four Republican lawmakers introduced a “memorial” calling on the federal government to “transfer title to all of federal public lands within Oregon’s borders directly to the State of Oregon.” That would amount to A LOT of property changing hands—more than half of the state is under federal control. Check out this useful map the Oregonian created to illustrate how much Oregon land is owned by the US government.
The memorial, like proposals that have popped up all over Western states recently, hinge on a notion that states can do a better job managing vast federal properties, and that they shouldn’t belong to the US government to begin with (Utah actually passed a bill in 2012). It’s an idea that’s growing increasingly popular among Western conservatives, according to a recent report by the conservation group the Center for Western Priorities.
In Oregon, the report makes particular note of state Representative Carl Wilson, a Grants Pass conservative and radio host who won cheers from Oath Keepers faithful last year for defending the miners in Josephine County. Wilson was a co-sponsor of the resolution on federal land reclamation. That resolution failed to get even a single hearing in the Democrat-dominated state legislature.
Other legislators who backed the land memorial: Sen. Kim Thatcher (R-Keizer), Sen. Tim Knopp (R-Bend), and Rep. Duane Stark (R-Grants Pass).
It’s more than just this, though. Multiple “Agenda 21” protest signs were waved at Burns, OR before the take-over. Far-right militia groups believe that the United Nations Agenda 21 – which is a non-binding, global agreement to practice sustainable development that promotes ecological balance – is a tool of implementing new world order. These people believe they’re making a stand against a one-world government; no matter what, the response to them is likely to radicalize more terrorists. Dumb, white, conservative terrorists.
This family receives prison time for an accidental burn, yet no one from the EPA was so much as hand slapped for that big spill in Colorado. After the Hammonds are gone the federal government will be free to fully exploit natural resources on federal and “monument” land in Harney County.
YeeHawd for the YallQaeda!
Oh it was an “accidental” burn, was it? Right.
@spindles – I thought that they were sent to prison for arson, that was covering up poaching. I read that in the Oregonian, so take it with a grain of salt. just curious…
They started those illegal fires knowing full well there were people camping in the area.
There was a jury trial in Pendleton with evidence they set the fire intentionally to cover up poaching. Convicted. No accidental burn.
If the feds divest themselves of this land, it should go back to the original occupiers; the native tribes which traversed the countryside, hunted, fished and took refuge on these parcels.
Yeah, Spindles, these rich cattle farmers had a slaughter of deer and wanted to cover it up by making a fire — this is my understanding, and now you got these idiot ya-hoos out there toting weapons trying to pick a fight.
GO HOME MUTHUFUCKERS!
Do people realize the State of Oregon will have to raise taxes to manage these huge areas of land? Obviously, no. And since most of them don’t live here they probably don’t care.
The Hammonds have at least three burns on record. One in 1999, which I do not know the circumstances of but they only received a warning for. One in 2001, which is poaching cover-up. And one in 2006 during a series of wildfire outbreaks when they set fires to protect their land, but there was a burn ban in place AND firefighters in the area who were put at risk.
The Hammonds might have a reasonable case. It’s a shame that the Cabinboys picked them as their scapegoat for armed insurrection.
The poaching deal is a ruse. I am a farmer/rancher and when livestock dies I have tried to burn carcasses in order to prevent deterioration and possible disease. You can pour diesel all over a carcass and it is almost impossible to burn. The hide and bones will remain no matter what. I have had to put down livestock by shooting them and I can assure you…bullet holes in the hide remain after burning them…they still show up. Covering up the shooting of ten deer? I don’t think so especially when that land is not much more than sagebrush and not much grass. It would take a massively hot fire to get rid of that kind of evidence. And by the way, when the BLM is violating the constitution and breaking laws, then what the group in Oregon is doing is upholding laws and causing the governmental lawbreakers to have to be accountable for there lawbreaking. The story is much deeper than you are getting through most media…do some research on how the BLM is trying to force them from the ranch because they want the rich resources located on the ranch such as Uranium that they want in order to sell it to the Chinese. They can’t get it until they run Hammond’s off of their ranch as they have scores of other ranchers. BLM interest in the land grew when this and other rich resources were discovered.