Wild Horse Education (WHE) will be running a “fact check” in live response to the BLM Advisory Board meeting.
You can join us on Twitter using the hashtag #WHBFactCheck or bookmark this page and the live fact check will be added below.
WHE will also be publishing a series of articles using the hashtag in each title beginning Monday.
Before the board meeting: Spaying, mass removal and resumption of sales to slaughter; what the meeting is all about HERE.
scroll down for fact check
BLM shows you only what they want you to see about the reality of our wild horses. WHE will fill in all the gaps they want hidden from view.
On Oct 29-31 (Tuesday-Thursday) The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Wild Horse and Burro Advisory Board will be meeting in DC. The agenda posted for the meeting is, as usual, vague (HERE).
On Tuesday the board will be in closed meetings and take a “field trip” out to a trailer on the National Mall. This trailer experience supposedly represents the “reality of the wild horses.” It is a project of the non-profit Mustang Heritage Foundation, that also runs the Extreme Mustang Makeover events. The non-profit operates with public donations, large grants and under various forms of contract with BLM. The exhibit is open to the public. (you can get a glimpse of the “experience” on their website.)
On Wednesday and Thursday the meeting will be open to the public. Public Comments will be allowed Thursday at 1:15. BLM asks that you sign up as early as possible and provide a written copy of your comments.
You can see past meeting clips on BLM’s Youtube page.
It is important to remember that the board is not a legal authority. As an example; the board could recommend BLM spay 90% of wild horses on the range, but that does not comply with current authorities in the Wild Free Roaming Horses and Burros Act, nor does it comply with the vast number of Land Use Plans (LUP, RMP) each BLM district must comply with. The board has the authority to exist, discuss and make recommendations. (webpage for the board)
The meeting will be live-streamed from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. local time (eastern) October 30-31 at www.blm.gov/live.
Wild Horse Education (WHE) will be running a “fact check” in live response.
You can join us on Twitter using the hashtag #WHBFactCheck or bookmark this page and the live fact check will be added below.
At a time when our public lands are being destroyed rapidly by industry (livestock and mining) the head of the BLM, William Perry Pendley, has made the absurd statement that wild horses are the biggest threat to public lands. The BLM is currently preparing to decimate our wild herds using a corporate sell-out by HSUS, ASPCA and Return to Freedom as justification. (learn more here)
Share this page and join us on Twitter.
If you are in the DC area? Go to the meeting and tell them what you think.
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For folks at the meeting? Can you please tell the board?
“Live” fact check will begin Tuesday, October 30, at 8 am eastern time. Our responses will appear here and on Twitter. Join us! #WHBFactCheck
William Perry Pendley, the man running the BLM that skirted Senate approval and has said the federal government should not manage public lands and, as an attorney, has litigated against federal management of public lands.
Pendley spoke about education in response to the question of “what are you doing to educate.” Pendley was NOT confirmed for his position by the Senate. (HERE)
note: Pendley managing BLM is the same as a climate change denial zealot in charge of plans to address the climate crisis.
He responded by saying he remembers working with Burford. To remind you who Burford was: Burford was the man that used a meeting under “collaboration” to begin to undercut the work of Velma Johnston, Wild Horse Annie. A bit about Velma time, at the bottom is a note about Burford. (HERE)
Pendley went on to call wild horses as the same as a wildfire burning in the West and he looks forward to moving aggressively against the problem wth their “partners.”
Pendley said wild horses are starving.
Fact: In the last two years removals took fat horses off range because of political pressure, livestock and mining. BLM neglects herds in trouble and removes herds for buddies.. One HMA hit twice in two years: https://bit.ly/2JCawLE
Bruce Rittenhouse, acting wild horse and burro chief.
“BLM prioritizes gathers based on herd health, rangeland health and safety conditions.”
Fact: BLM has removed healthy wild horses off healthy rangelands in two years. BLM has ignored areas of concern for years (like Cold Creek) because there are no powerful permittees running livestock. BLM manages for politics, not herd health.
Rittenhouse made a claim that Antelope was removed as an example of the work they do this year “for rangeland health.” He showed a pic that was a cow bashed area in a district with rampant livestock trespass.
Facts about Antelope: Antelope was also one of the most secretive BLM has done in recent memory. BLM has a transparency problem. In a district where BLM fired a career employee for reporting trespass. MORE on the Antelope roundup HERE.
Rittenhouse: BLM NV did not adopt out a lot of wild horses because they are too busy gathering horses.
FACT: The range program is staffed and funded through districts. Facilities are staffed and funded by national. It’s not even the same people that work on range and at roundups that work on adoptions!
A better answer would be that BLM has more public lands than population in NV. Not a lot of people in comparison to other states. It is also true that adopting a wild horse is also based on “who you know.” If you are a permittee or rodeo participant BLM is a lot more helpful. If you are associated with advocacy? Adoptions can be made extremely difficult.
Statement: In order to get to healthy herds on healthy rangelands we need to aggressively remove wild horses to AML.
FACT: AML is not scientifically justified and based on politics of the 1970’s. Rittenhouse began his discussion by explaining how difficult it is, even with modern technology, to get an accurate count. In 2013 BLM began to change inventory methods yet they continue to compare those numbers to inventory done prior and scream “overpopulated.”
We think BLM employees need to go talk to a 5th grade teacher. They are not mathematically sound using simple Algebra 101.
French (who sits on the board) does not seem to understand how BLM sets AML, how they address HA/HMA boundary lines.
How do people get chosen to sit on the board (repeatedly) that do not understand BLM 101? Or are they checking to see if BLM understands BLM 101?
Seasonal movement also seems to be an issue for French. The issue is not that BLM drew boundary lines WRONG because they did not include basic concepts like seasonal movement. The issue seems to be that is horses move, they need to be removed.
FACT: AML and boundary lines are based on fictions and politics. Wild horses are forced into areas that are illogical and some HMAs have no year round water source; that is how inaccurate these boundary lines are. Start with the NAS review: https://wildhorseeducation.org/2013/06/05/nas-report-a-first-look/
Perryman: Yelled at Rittenhouse that BLM not getting to AML and managing for a “thriving natural ecological balance” (translation: removing wild horses to unscientific numbers and prioritizing livestock) is a “national disgrace.”
FACTS:
- Destroying wild horse populations, that are being scapegoated for livestock, is a national disgrace.
- Federal employees that report trespass livestock (illegal use) getting fired is a national disgrace.
- Employees that try to do their jobs and private citizens that care about the environment getting their lives threatened is a national disgrace.
- Hardrock mining not paying the public since 1872 for the massive amounts of riches they remove from the ground as the pollute and destroy water quality and the environment, and the taxpayer has to pay to clean it up, is a national disgrace.
NOTE: board on break. Yes, we will go back and fact check many of the lies you are hearing. It is hard when almost every sentence has a basis in fallacy to type that fast! We will look into an audio blow by blow for the next meeting and we can speak in a fact check like a sportscaster! Back soon!
Board is back after lunch. The “cowboy” mythos continues.
#WHBFactCheck What the board will not address about #wildhorses is more important than what it will address: habitat loss, livestock and mining impacts, fencing impacts, etc. The board is only interested in one thing: blame the horse, remove the horse. bit.ly/2JzzYRS
We heard the board push for a “programmatic EA” to increase rapid removals so BLM does not spend time doing a site specific EA.
FACT: BLM is required to do a site specific analysis under NEPA for a reason. The reason has been held up in court. Currently we (the public) can not bring a programmatic challenge under law into court. If BLM does a programmatic EA it will open the door to that challenge in a court. Maybe that is why BLM wont do it?
Rittenhouse said “I’m not a NEPA expert.”
Fact: NEPA is the process that governs every proposed action. As he sits at the head of the BLM program he demonstrated he does not understand NEPA for wild horses, the handbook or the law. His inaccuracies are so voluminous that we will write an entire article. WHY is he leading the program?
Board, multiple members, continue to ask BLM to create breeding programs on range.
FACT: Selective breeding to hide inbreeding from stacking levels that are too low? Range breeding programs are not management of “wild” under law.
We had an internet freeze. We are back.
If this were a REAL Advisory Board for any other interest, they would be asking WHY BLM is not answering important FOIA requests, only providing blacked out pages. >> bit.ly/2qTnwG0
Far too many board members are asserting that wild horses have no natural predators therefore we need to remove more than 80% of the current population.
FACT: Yes, they do. But when they do they get killed to suit livestock on public lands. Killing predators & removing wild horses cost taxpayer big $ for private cows. >> bit.ly/34iqcLE
French: We can not use fertility control in areas we have to catch horses to treat them because it gets too hard too catch them.
FACT: Absolute NONSENSE that wild horses get harder to catch with repeated roundups (an excuse for not doing fertility control). The horses at Reveille face a catch, treat and release every 2-3 years. Not harder to catch, “they know the drill.” >> wildhorseeducation.org/?s=reveille
Board has adjourned for today. We will be updating on all the “non facts” spouted as time allows.
Wed BLM has primarily covered the adoption/sale program for the first hour. BLM is failing to tell you is that the most events are “adoption/sale.” “Sale” is transfer of title immediately. At the events you can buy a horse if you do not want to wait a year for title. It’s kinda like a car, once you have title you can simply sell it. (more on adoption/sale)
Fred Woehl, Advisory Board, gave an interview about #wildhorses. Things like those pesky advocates and all the litigation. Doesn’t he know that livestock permittees file ten times more legal actions against BLM? #WHBFactCheck kalb.com/content/news/5 Board needs a #NEPA class too.
OVERALL NOTE to readers that feel very frustrated at statements like the BLM WHB lead, Rittenhouse, stating he is not an “expert” on NEPA when asked basic questions on the subject (NEPA governs all actions taken by the agency). It is not just the WHB program that is facing massive knowledge deficits in management, it is all agencies. https://www.peer.org/news/press-releases/horrid-time-to-work-inside-interior-department.html?fbclid=IwAR3HbXJ5hBTPkKa8yL24nCMEj1Ey_zsiCYu5-G72w5v_MxPcXn3eHBTgivc
URGENT, just notified!
Our representatives on the hill just alerted us that Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) has proposed an amendment to Interior Appropriations that contains broad sweeping ramifications for BLM. It will open the floor to debate. Debate and vote scheduled at 11:30 am eastern time.
Please call NOW.
script:
I am calling about the Interior Appropriations for wild horses.
NO sales to slaughter. NO sterilization. NO additional funding until BLM releases the Report to Congress that is over 3 months late.
Maintain status quo on funding and authorities until BLM report can be scrutinized.
CALL NOW.
call committee members (particularly if one is your rep!)
committee: https://www.govtrack.us/congress/committees/SSEG
Find your Senator: http://gvtrack.us
~~~ fact check continued
Board: Uneducated groups that do not understand ecological disaster! How dare they litigate against spaying!
FACT: National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is opposed to spaying. We do understand ecological disaster. We also understand scapegoating. DEAL with livestock trespass, livestock damage, and stop blaming it on wild horses! https://bit.ly/2Wu3Fch
Yes, there was discussion on fertility control and the scapegoated of the wild horse for livestock damage was off the charts. We are scrambling to address the debate on Interior budget that will open with Mike Lee (R-UT) budget amendments. We will be back soon.
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Board: You can not release wild horses in holding back to range. Dangerous precedent.
FACT: BLM already has the authority to do it. They also have authority to repopulate HAs. Board needs a wild horse law 101 class.
Board: If you turn wild horses in holding back out they wont be able to figure out where to get feed or water!
FACT: Then how come it is claimed that people are turning horses out and they are not really wild? Horses will look for, smell, find, other horses and be just fine. They were captured from the wild, they understand wild behavior. They are NOT domestics.
The board, that has not one advocate on it, wants BLM to support the board taking legislators out to the range. Another taxpayer funded propaganda tour? YOU pay the boards travel and expense. The public would need to be invited. If not? #FOIA
VOTE OVER. NO VOTE on Lee amendment on transfer of land and authority. NO ADDITIONS on Wild horses. Bill still stands as passed with $35 million in additional funding for the mass removals, sterilization, etc.
The House and Senate bills do not match. The bills must be consolidated. Continue calling with the alert above both your House Reps and Senate Reps. We are currently under a continuing resolution that holds BLM budget and authorities at current levels. Keep calling until bills are consolidated and STOP the funding of a disaster to our wild ones!
We will update later on more from Senate and House after the Advisory meeting.
Get to know Advisory Board: Perryman “What’s good for the grouse is good for the cows” / “There is a large body of science directly related to fuels management” his work to increase cow chow while #wildhorses, #sagegrouse and #publiclands take a hit. bit.ly/2C1QplP
Public comment brought up “emotions and feelings of wild horse advocates.” OK… let’s talk about Extremism? Doncha think threats and violence are a bit more extreme than advocates that make calls or litigate? https://wildhorseeducation.org/?s=extremism
Callie Hendrikson of Farm Bureau set to give public comment. We urge you to check out Callie’s credibility as she speaks to Congress. Lies or did somebody hand her a lie? Either way, it’s a lie. https://wildhorseeducation.org/2017/05/17/posttruth-a-few-wild-facts-you-should-know-in-these-dangerous-times-part-one/
NOTE: The advocates commenting are showing more knowledge of the law and program than the board. GREAT JOB! We hope you all send your comments to your Reps in Congress!
WHE is working on an update to our work on a humane policy. WHE is the only org to ever litigate the issue and we have been busy. CAWP is key to our work.
WHE are working on an update on our transparency work (our First Amendment fight) for roundups and facilities. Update soon.
GOOD WORK ADVOCACY! A LOT MORE TO DO.
Follow further updates on main website: http://WildHorseEducation.org
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Categories: Wild Horse Education
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