Our wild horses are in danger. Do you understand the threats? 

This is very important for our readers to understand. We are asking for disclosure and accountability. The Office of the Inspector General is one of the few oversight agencies that address federal land management. Many people are aware of the OIG’s role in validating allegations of the slaughter sales to Tom Davis (nearly 1800 wild horses) by the Bureau of Land Management. (DOI IG is the Department of Interior Office of the Inspector General).

OIG case 17-0707 addresses serious concerns in corruption in the BLM wild horse program. The OIG turned the investigation over to the very agency suspect in the complaint. 

If we are to have management of public land for the public good and accountable to the law we can not obstruct investigations involving illegal activity. Right now that obstruction goes far beyond funding for the OIG. 

We are at midterm. There is still no director appointed to the BLM. Destabilization of land management appears to be a political objective that has many tendrils.

At this moment there is legislation out of Utah Senator Mike Lee (R) that will strip management authority from federal agencies and hand it over to the states, your public land wont be your public land anymore. Your wild horses will go with it. 

Today, prior to addressing the outstanding FOIA requests into BLM wild horse sale program. wild horse advocacy is buzzing that BLM changed their sale policy. The only reason to change the policy is to encourage people that buy a lot of horses in one swoop, kill buyers in the slaughter trade. Accountability to those actions comes from oversight like that provided by the OIG. https://wildhorseeducation.org/2018/07/18/blm-end-runs-congress-to-sell-wild-horses-to-slaughter-response/

Without full funding of the OIG there is no accountability. The following is from Raul Grijalva. We do have a wild horse action you can take below this article.

From the Office of Raul Grijalva.

Washington, D.C. – Moments ago the House Republican majority voted down Ranking Member Raúl M. Grijalva’s (D-Ariz.) amendment to the Department of the Interior (DOI) funding bill that sought to increase the DOI Office of Inspector General’s (OIG) funding by $2.5 million. Grijalva said the vote shows how stubbornly Republicans refuse to hold Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke or the rest of the Trump administration’s DOI appointees accountable for their multiple scandals, policy failures and embarrassing missteps.

In addition to the funding increase, Grijalva’s amendment authorizes the hiring of five new auditors to address contracts and financial assistance, five investigators to focus on administrative issues, and up to six new investigators in field offices to allow OIG criminal investigators to focus on criminal misconduct.

“Secretary Zinke is already the most scandal-plagued Interior secretary in recent memory, and House Republicans just voted against holding him accountable,” Grijalva said today. “They’re comfortable passing a trillion-dollar tax cut for the rich but won’t spend two and a half million dollars on a watchdog agency that protects the public and saves taxpayers money. Something is very wrong with this picture.”

Zinke is the subject of at least 14 formal government investigations, more than the last four Interior secretaries combined. The DOI Office of the Inspector general is handling the bulk of those efforts, with others taking place at the Office of Special Counsel and the Government Accountability Office. Current OIG funding and staffing levels have proven inadequate given OIG’s overwhelming workload of investigations and financial audits.

Increasing OIG’s funding would have a positive economic impact, as the office’s work generates an approximately 20-to-1 return to taxpayers. Even as DOI awarded approximately $10 billion in financial assistance and contracts in fiscal years 2016 and 2017, the number of OIG audits dropped roughly 16 percent. Contracts and financial assistance are some of the highest risk areas in terms of the potential for waste, fraud, and abuse.

~~~~~~

Take Action!

This is “big picture” time.

The BLM report to Congress is a 25 page document that is shorter than the Final EA on Caliente. The report to Congress is a demonstration of extreme disrespect to both Congress and the American public. The document is simply a bad joke perpetuated that “BLM and DOI” actually know anything about wild horses. The BLM report is simply a wish list of proslaughter political factions.  (if you missed that report read here:   https://wildhorseeducation.org/2018/04/27/blm-report-to-congress/)

Call your Congressional representative and urge them to:

Ask your representative to do all they can to support an investigation into the BLM wild horse and burro program. Ask your representative to support an investigation into corruption and extremism on public lands. 

Deny release of funding for Appropriations in fiscal year 2019 that begins October 15 for the BLM Wild Horse and Burro program (beyond feeding and caring for captive wild horses) until Zinke and his staff create a real report on the BLM wild horse and burro program. The 25 pages provided to Congress by the BLM is not a report, it’s a “wish list” provided by one faction. 

Deny all funding for any removal except in emergencies. Deny all funding for experimental procedures that waste tax payer funding like spaying. Deny all funding until they do their job and create a real report. 

Demand that the BLM report to Congress addresses the BLM sale program and where over 20,000 wild horses have gone since 2016.

Ask your representative to demand a full report from Zinke.  25 pages is simply an insult to both you and your Congressman.

Find you rep here: https://govtrack.us