Source: U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
Both Trump and Zinke say they oppose the transfer of federal land to states, but when it came to vote last week, Zinke voted to make it easier to do land transfers. This would not be good for the wild horses and burros.
Congressman Ryan Zinke (Montana)
366 Dirksen 02:15 PM
This notice is to advise you of a hearing before the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. The hearing will be held on Tuesday, January 17, 2017 at 2:15 p.m. in Room 366 Dirksen Senate Office Building in Washington, DC.
The purpose of the hearing is to consider the nomination of the Honorable Ryan Zinke to be the Secretary of the Interior.
The hearing will be webcast live on the committee’s website, and an archived video will be available shortly after the hearing is complete. Witness testimony will be available on the website at the start of the hearing.
Categories: Horse News, Uncategorized
Straight from the Horse's Heart 
Want to thank Rep. Steven Pearce NM for standing up against this cruel practice, he has expressed his concern as well, good call Rep. Pearce%%%%%%
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I am extremely concerned about Trump’s pick for Secretary of the Interior: As a Montana State Senator, Ryan Zinke sponsored a bill to promote the opening of slaughter plants in his state, explaining, “When a horse is too old to breed, too old to ride or too expensive to feed, a horse is disposed of.”
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Pretty cold-blooded comment. Has this man ever heard of a debt of gratitude for an animal that served loyally? Find a new home or shelter for them? No moral or ethical obligation to them whatsoever?
I had held off judgment of him because the alternatives were so much worse, and his only saving grace was that he was opposed to auctioning off our public lands to the highest bidder.
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I agree if this is where he stands we don’t need him
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I had no idea that he said that! Pretty much sums up what we can expect for our wild ones in the near near future with him in charge. Sick.
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If you voted for trump you voted for this whole scenario. You surely saw it coming. I did. My thoughts were that out was better to have to fight one man’s agenda than to have to fight whole teams of living dead.
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Sadly, the people who DID vote for trump probably dont care about this!
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That’s quite ignorant, Terri. There are plenty of us who voted for Trump and who strongly oppose Zinke’s feelings on this (and other matters)! I care a great deal about our lands and the freedom of our wild horses and burros AND I am a Trump supporter – imagine that. But, thank you for the judgement.
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Alex, I apologize! Its easy to forget that once the election was over – even as divisive as it was – that we all still live here together! All the rhetoric & propaganda sure doesnt help. And honestly, our wild horses & burros need ALL of us working for them.
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Just read Tuesday’s Horse article showing Mr. Zinke’s voting record! Regardless of what he stated in the hearing – he has voted to sell off public lands & prevent more wildlife habitat etc etc etc. Really depressing!
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The battle is just getting started.
Wild Horse & Burro Advocates are seasoned warriors
Environmental groups around the country are mobilizing to oppose Trump’s picks for EPA administrator, Secretary of State, and more
https://thinkprogress.org/activist-opposition-to-trump-enviro-picks-b9816391d7ee#.wh2z6v54u
Across the country -over television airwaves, in local congressional offices, and even in the halls of Congress - environmental groups have been actively pressuring lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to oppose nominees like Tillerson, Oklahoma Attorney General and EPA administrator nominee Scott Pruitt, former Texas governor and nominee for Secretary of Energy Rick Perry, Alabama senator and Attorney General nominee Jeff Sessions (R), and Montana representative and Secretary of Interior nominee Ryan Zinke.
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Control of EPA allows them to mismanage Legally withput having to pay a single bribe. So we need. Some one with a legal conscience in this position and the moral aptitude to do the Right thing not the financially motivated or pressured thing. This isnt that guy
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The problem is that all of the agencies have gotten too much power and operate like fiefdoms. Added to that is the ever revolving door that allows corporations to enter and take over….they have been hijacked.
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From OUTDOOR ALLIANCE
3 MAJOR DIFFERENCES BETWEEN STATE LANDS AND PUBLIC LANDS
http://www.outdooralliance.org/blog/2016/3/16/sqirba7p80kpbt808e7fktik3y5iwe
Most western states have a mix of state-managed land and public, federally-managed land. State land and public land have different goals, and different rules about access, and there’s plenty of room for both in most states. Proponents of the public land heist would have you think that state management is the same as public federal management, but we spent some time researching state land trust websites, and what we found there made it pretty clear that state land and public land have different goals.(see chart below)
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Public Lands May Be America’s Best Climate Defense (excerpts)
http://www.climatecentral.org/news/public-lands-may-be-americas-best-climate-defense-18739
Scientists and public lands managers say that taking land out of federal hands could reduce public lands’ role in combating climate change.
Ecosystems that are relatively intact have a better chance of maintaining biodiversity because they are not under as much stress as ecosystems fragmented by human development, said Dominick DellaSala, chief scientist of the Geos Institute in Ashland, Ore., which works with the federal government to help protect carbon-dense forests
For public lands to play a major role in combating climate change and educating the public about it, it’s important for as many of those lands as possible to be conserved, DellaSala said.
“Public lands, especially intact areas, are our best hope for maintaining a connection to the natural world,” he said. “It’s our responsibility as stewards to pass their natural inheritance on to the next generation that will otherwise be dealing with a world devoid of wildlife, clean water, and an increasingly dangerous climate.”
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This whole comment would be great to include on those “sign the petition ” and “write to your representative ” sites! Don’t you think?
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whats really bad for our horses is The man appointed for USDA oversight “Trump has named Brian Klippenstein (Executive Director of Protect the Harvest)to the USDA Landing Team for the Presidential transition” That group “protect the harvest ” they’re ready to take all the wild horses from holding & what BLM calls excess & be an outlet for excess breeders horses & horse auctions. They’ve even hired slaughterhouse sues old buddie Dave D. .
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No Way!! Good grief, more and more and more nightmares – without a feasible ~end~ in sight? {so depressing. 😦 especially after so much work by so many for so long… and some actual recent Good results! }
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Zinke is the last person to be anywhere near the horse’s/animal’s of any kind and the land that’s set aside for them. I am ashamed he was voted in.
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Congress Quietly Passes New Rule Allowing House Members To Hide Records From Ethics Probes
Politicians can now shield expenditures from investigations.
01/10/2017
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/secret-new-rule-allows-house-members-to-hide-records-from-ethics-probes_us_58746aefe4b099cdb0ff34eb
The change essentially makes a member of Congress the owner and sole controller of any records he or she creates, regardless of whether those documents touch on a public interest, such as use of taxpayer funds or the commission of a crime.
“Records created, generated, or received by the congressional office of a Member … are exclusively the personal property of the individual member … and such Member … has control over such records,” the regulation states.
The change granting records control to members was passed without much notice amid news of a plan to gut the independence of the Office of Congressional Ethics, which caused a public outcry but failed to pass.
Under the new regulation, a lawmaker being investigated for misuse of taxpayer funds, for example, might now assert the privilege to withhold spending records from law enforcement authorities. Had that measure existed earlier, certain accounts might not have been accessible for corruption investigations that resulted in charges against members of Congress.
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I’m getting the feeling that our country may become unrecognizable as in “the DisUnified States of Disturbia“ within the next few years…? (I, for one, am highly disturbed by the Changing directions 😦 such as the “bill” described in this article. ).
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This was more than 20 years ago
Whistleblowers Claim Abuses Run Rampant in Horse Policy
By Jillian Lloyd, Special to The Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/1996/0814/081496.us.us.5.html
Former and current employees say shady dealings are customary in the BLM horse program. “The American public is being cheated out of millions of dollars a year,” says Steven Sederwall, a BLM law-enforcement agent who retired last year. “In 23 years as a cop, I’ve never seen anything like the depth of corruption I’ve seen in the BLM.”
Last month, Mr. Sederwall and five former colleagues sent a nine-page letter to US Attorney General Janet Reno, detailing “an ever-growing list of felony criminal violations committed by the Bureau of Land Management.” Charges include BLM employees selling wild horses to slaughterhouses and rodeo circuits; falsified financial and horse inventory records; misappropriation of funds; and obstruction of justice during investigations.
But in a June 1993 memorandum to the Interior Department inspector general, Mr. Johnson wrote regarding a federal investigation in New Mexico: “Through the initial phase of the investigation, it is apparent that administrative actions by some BLM wranglers and program administrators have not been in compliance with the direction and guidance provided…. In many of the adoptions and group adoptions reviewed, personnel from BLM apparently promoted the adoption of horses for commercial gain.”
But sources inside the BLM say thousands of horses are taken illegally from rangelands each year. If money changes hands, it’s strictly off the books. As for documented adoptions, sources say backdated paperwork is a common tactic to give adopters quicker title to a horse.
Sederwall, who led the initial Del Rio investigation for the BLM, claims the agency is hiding something. “We’ve got all the evidence, but they successfully covered it up.”
He contends that Galloway was ready to implicate BLM officials. “They couldn’t prosecute Galloway because he was going to turn evidence against the BLM. Galloway only did what they taught him,” Sederwall says.
Sederwall says he was taken off the Del Rio case after he uncovered incriminating evidence against BLM management. He and 14 other investigators were ordered not to speak to the grand jury, he says. Eventually, these agents were all reportedly transferred, fired, or pressured into early retirement.
Reed Smith, deputy state BLM director for New Mexico until he retired in 1994, maintains “BLM management fought the Del Rio investigation with everything they had.”
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Whistleblowers Claim Abuses Run Rampant in Horse Policy (more excerpts)
By Jillian Lloyd, Special to The Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/1996/0814/081496.us.us.5.html
Another federal grand jury is reviewing allegations of internal fraud in the Jackson, Miss., BLM office. The US attorney there would not comment on the investigation. But a BLM employee in the Jackson office says, “What this program has done in reality is make a few people very rich…. You can talk to rangers, special agents, BLM people all over the US, who have independently come to the same conclusion,” he says. “If a dozen people are hollering smoke, smoke, smoke, there has got to be fire.”
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So, Louie, this makes it perfectly clear that for 20 years the BLM has been able to do what they want with apparently noone able to stop them! Nice that the Christian Science Monitor wrote an article about it – WE all have known for years – but seems the “mainstream media” just cant tear themselves away from “trending” news!
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