Last week, while in Nevada for a Western Governors’ Association event, Department of Interior Secretary Sally Jewell promised that scofflaw rancher Cliven Bundy will be held accountable for his unlawful actions. Bundy has been allowing his cattle to graze illegally in southern Nevada on and off for decades, and land near his ranch was the site of an armed standoff in April 2014 between his states’ rights-oriented supporters and federal officials and contractors…

Environmental groups that are concerned about the impact of grazing say that by allowing ranchers like Bundy to let livestock graze illegally in sensitive habitat encourages others to do the same, to the detriment of ecosystems. At least three green organizations, Center for Biological Diversity, WildEarth Guardians and Oregon Wild, have now partnered with the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, the Southern Poverty Law Center and others to create the Ballots not Bullets Coalition. The Coalition launched in May, around the time that the conservative militia-type organization Oath Keepers and others, including two Bundy family representatives, gathered in southern Oregon to support gold miners in a dispute with the BLM.

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