Bundy jailed

Scofflaw rancher Cliven Bundy last week was arrested on an array of charges stemming from the April/May 2014 standoff at Bundy’s Clark County ranch.

Bundy, 69, was arrested at Portland International Airport after deplaning on his way to visit his jailed son Ammon, arrested in a separate dispute.

The elder Bundy is charged with assault on a federal officer, weapon use an possession, extortion to interfere with commerce and aiding and abetting, obstruction and conspiracy, which carry the possibility of 40 years in prison and more than $1 million in fines.

The 2014 standoff came after Bundy had grazed his cattle on the public’s lands without pay fees for two decades, running up a bill of unpaid fees of more than a million dollars. No current figure is available for how much he now owes.

The Bureau of Land Management, which had failed to act to halt the illegal grazing all those years, finally started a roundup of the cattle that were being grazed illegally. Anti-government activists, many arms, turned the dispute into a convention and traveled to the site where it turned into a long standoff. The BLM finally withdrew to avoid violence.