On January 2, 2016, an armed group of right-wing militants seized and occupied the headquarters of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Harney County, Oregon, and continued to occupy it until law enforcement made a final arrest on February 11, 2016. Their leader was Ammon Bundy, who participated in the 2014 Bundy standoff at his father's Nevada ranch. Other members of the group were loosely affiliated with non-governmental militias and the sovereign citizen movement.
The organizers were seeking an opportunity to advance their view that the federal government is constitutionally required to turn over most of the federal public land they manage to the individual states, in particular land managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), United States Forest Service (USFS), and other agencies. In 2015, the militants believed they could do this by protesting the treatment of two area ranchers convicted of federal land arson, who they believed were wrongly convicted, even though the men in question, Dwight and Steven Dwight Hammond, father and son, did not want their assistance. The occupation began when Bundy led an armed party to the refuge headquarters following a peaceful public rally in the nearby city of Burns.
By February 11, all of the militants had surrendered or withdrawn from the occupation, with several leaders having been arrested after leaving the site; one of them, Robert LaVoy Finicum, was shot and killed during an attempt to arrest him after he reached toward a handgun concealed in his pocket after he tried to evade a roadblock; Ryan Bundy was wounded. More than two dozen of the militants were charged with federal offenses, including conspiracy to obstruct federal officers, firearms violations, theft, and depredation of federal property.
By August 2017, a dozen had pleaded guilty, and six of those had been sentenced to 1–2 years' probation, some including house arrest. Seven others, including Ammon and Ryan Bundy, were tried and acquitted of all federal charges. Five more had been found guilty and were sentenced months later. Seven of the militants saw prison time for their roles in the occupation. Jake Ryan and Duane Ehmer each received 366 days in prison, with Ryan additionally getting three years of supervised probation. Darryl Thorn received 18 months of prison time on November 21, 2017. Jason Patrick received 21 months on February 15, 2018. Ryan Payne was sentenced to 37 months in federal prison and 3 years of supervision on February 27, 2018. Jon Ritzheimer was sentenced to 366 days in federal prison and another 12 months in a residential re-entry program. Corey Lequieu was sentenced to 30 months in prison and three years of supervision. Two others, Joe O'Shaughnessy and Brian Cavalier, were detained for at least a year but released after time served, with three years of supervision each and fines.Wiles, Tay. Acquitted, convicted, fined or free: after the Oregon standoff. High Country News. April 2018.
Background Location
Harney County is a rural county in eastern Oregon. The county seat is the city of Burns. Though it is one of the largest counties by area in the United States, its population is only about 7,700, and cattle outnumber people 14 to 1. About 73 percent of the county's area is federal land, variously managed by the United States Bureau of Land Management (BLM), the United States Forest Service (USFS), and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS).
The Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, located in Harney County, was established in 1908 by President Theodore Roosevelt, a conservationist. Located in the Pacific Flyway, and currently encompassing , it is "one of the premiere sites for birds and birding in the U.S.", according to the Audubon Society of Portland. Tourism, especially birding, injects million into the local economy annually.
Leadership
The leader of the occupation was Ammon Bundy—a native of Bunkerville, Nevada, owner of a car fleet management company in Phoenix, Arizona, and a recent resident of Emmett, Idaho. Ammon Bundy was also the leader of a group which he formed shortly before the occupation, which he later named the Citizens for Constitutional Freedom.
Ammon's father, Cliven D. Bundy, had organized and led a somewhat similar incident in March 2014, roughly two years earlier. Both Bundys are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and claimed that their armed opposition to the federal government was ordained for them via divine messages ordering them to do so.
Also in a leadership position amongst the militants was the group's occasional spokesman LaVoy Finicum, another Mormon, who owned a ranch at Cane Beds, in the Arizona Strip, near the community of Colorado City, Arizona. He had recently authored a self-published post-apocalyptic novel. Ammon's brother, Ryan Bundy, was also amongst the militants present, and was later arrested for his role in the occupation.
On December 1, 2019, an investigation commissioned by the Washington House of Representatives reported then-Washington state legislator, theocrat, and white supremacist Matt Shea, had planned and participated in domestic terrorism on at least three occasions.From Ruby Ridge to Matt Shea, eastern Washington struggles to shake far-right extremism, Los Angeles Times, December 20, 2019. Retrieved December 23, 2019. This included his participation, organizing, planning, and promotion of the 2014 Bundy standoff in Nevada; the 2015 armed conflict in Priest River, Idaho; and the 2016 armed seizure of the Malheur Refuge. Shea led a delegation of right-wing legislators from Oregon, Washington, and Idaho that met with law enforcement on January 9, 2016, in Burns, Oregon, where they were apprised of confidential intended law enforcement strategies for dealing with the refuge occupiers. The state House district's Republican Representative, Cliff Bentz, attended the meeting, despite being warned by Harney County Judge Steven Grasty to decline the invitation. Bentz did, however, warn western Oregon state Representative Dallas Heard, from Roseburg, that it would be "inappropriate" for Heard to attend, though Heard ignored the advice.Ore. state legislator meets with armed group at wildlife refuge, KGW, January 11, 2016. Retrieved December 24, 2019. Shea then disclosed those details to the Bundys, according to the report.
Hammond arson case
In 2012, Dwight Lincoln Hammond Jr., 73, and Steven Dwight Hammond, 46, were both convicted of two counts of arson on federal land, in relation to two fires they set in 2001 and 2006. In a mid-trial settlement agreement, the Hammonds agreed not to appeal the arson convictions to have other charges dismissed by the government. The Hammonds were also told the prosecutor would seek the mandatory minimum sentence of five years. United States' Supplemental Sentencing Memorandum (filed September 21, 2015), United States v. Hammond, Case No. 6:10-cr-60066-AA (D. Ore.). Ultimately, Dwight Hammond was sentenced to three months' imprisonment and his son Steven was sentenced to a year and a day's imprisonment, which both men served. In 2015, the sentences were, however, vacated by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which then remanded re-sentencing. Brief for the United States in Opposition, Hammond v. United States, Docket No. 13-1512. Petition for certiorari denied on March 23, 2015. See: "Hammond v. United States : SCOTUSblog" and "Bloomberg Law - Document - United States v. Hammond, 742 F.3d 880 (9th Cir. 2014), Court Opinion" for related documents. In October 2015, a judge re-sentenced the Hammonds to five years in prison (with credit for time served), ordering that they return to prison on January 4, 2016. Stephen was scheduled to be released on June 29, 2019, and Dwight on February 13, 2020.Federal Inmate Locator, Federal Bureau of Prisons. Retrieved July 3, 2018. They were pardoned by then-President Donald Trump on July 10, 2018.
In late 2015, the Hammonds' case attracted the attention of Ammon Bundy and Ryan Payne. In November 2015, Bundy and his associates began publicizing the Hammonds' case via social media. On YouTube. Over the ensuing weeks, Bundy and Payne attempted to set up plans for what they described as a peaceful protest with Harney County Sheriff, David M. Ward, as well as request that the sheriff's office protect the Hammonds from being taken into custody by federal authorities. A sympathetic Ward declined Bundy and Payne's request. He later said that he began receiving death threats by email.
Despite several early meetings with Bundy and Payne, the Hammonds eventually rejected their offers of assistance.
Prelude to the occupation On November 5, 2015, Ammon Bundy called Harney County Sheriff David Ward and arranged a meeting later the same day. At the meeting, Ammon Bundy and Montana militiaman Ryan Payne insisted to Sheriff Ward that Ward must shield Dwight and Steven Hammond against re-imprisonment. Ward recalled that when he explained that he did not have the authority to shield the Hammonds from a lawful sentence, Bundy's and Payne's demeanor became threatening. Payne told Ward that if he did not shield the Hammonds from imprisonment, "thousands" of armed militiamen would come to the county to "do Ward's job" for him—and Payne pointedly noted that he might not be able to control what else the militia might do.Walker, Peter. Sagebrush Collaboration: How Harney County Defeated the Takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. Oregon State University Press 2018 By late fall, local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies noticed that members of anti-government militias had started to relocate to Harney County, and the USFWS began circulating a photograph of Ammon Bundy with instructions for staff to "be on the lookout".
By early December 2015, Bundy and Payne had moved to Burns. The same month, they organized a meeting at the Harney County Fairgrounds to rally support for their efforts. At the meeting, a "committee of safety" was organized by Bundy and Payne to orchestrate direct action against the Hammond sentences. According to that group's website, the Harney County Committee of Safety considers itself "a governmental body established by the people in the absence of the ability of the existing government to provide for the needs and protection of civilized society" (during the American Revolution, committees of safety were shadow governments organized to usurp authority from colonial administrators).
From mid-November to late December 2015, residents began to notice significant numbers of outsiders in the community, often dressed in military-style attire and openly carrying handguns and sometimes rifles. Some of these armed newcomers engaged in what local people considered threatening and harassing behavior, such as approaching shoppers in local stores and aggressively asking their opinions about the Hammond family. Many residents considered these actions deliberate intimidation, intended to sway the community to join the outsider's unspecified plan to "protect" the Hammonds from re-arrest. Contrary to local custom, some residents began carrying guns in public locations. Many lived in fear that some kind of violent event was about to take place.Walker, Peter (2018). Sagebrush Collaboration: How Harney County Defeated the Takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. Oregon State University Press.