John King, Molly Ball and Peter Hamby discuss comments by Sen. Reid about rancher Cliven Bundy’s supporters.
There’s controversy this week about what Senator Harry Reid knows about domestic terrorism. Senator Reid claimed yesterday that rancher Cliven Bundy’s supporters had sniper rifles, and assault weapons; but reports, supported by video documentation, claimed that agents in K-9 units made threats that their dogs would bite Bundy’s supporters, and that Bureau of Land Management agents and other law enforcement agents brought out assault weapons, snipers, and tasers. There was also a report that a mother of eleven children pushed to the ground. Some assert that the encounter showed a federal over-reaction, especially by comparison to the federal authorities attitude toward border violations and drug trade crimes that are ignored or mishandled in neighboring Arizona. Others agree with Reid’s assertion that Bundy is a lawbreaker, but it’s not certain yet how many U.S. citizens believe that the rancher and his supporters are domestic terrorists.
“They’re nothing more than domestic terrorist”
— Sen. Harry Reid
Last week, a 20-year legal dispute over grazing fees between the United States Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and cattle rancher Cliven Bundy and his supporters, heated into forceful confiscation of trespassing cattle, and an armed confrontation in southeastern Nevada.
Bundy grazed his cattle legally on an area of federal land near Bunkerville prior to 1993, but when grazing rules were changed in the Gold Butte, Nevada area in Clark County, Bundy became involved in a legal battle with the US government. Bundy believes that the land belongs to the state and that county sheriffs should keep federal authorities off the land and prevent them from enforcing their “invalid” legal requirements.
The federal government asserts that the land is federal land, and that Bundy owes over $1 million in unpaid grazing fees on the land. The roundup of what the federal government calls “trespass cattle” occurred in an area that covers 1,200 square miles in Clark County.
Senator Harry Reid is the senior United States Senator from Nevada, who has been a member of the Democratic Party serving since 1987. He has been the Senate Majority Leader since January 2007, having previously served as Minority Leader and Minority and Majority Whip.
A LOOK AT HARRY REID’S “TERRORISTS” …
Video from Dennis Michael Lynch that shows him approaching Bureau of Land Management and other authorities.
[SOME GRAPHIC LANGUAGE] Protestors at the Bundy Ranch in Bunkerville, Nevada in confrontation with Bureau of Land Managment agent on ground April 9, 2014, chanting, “BLM, go away!”