Horse News

Ryan Zinke’s meeting with Protect the Harvest’s Forrest Lucas & Dave Duquette included execs from Proof Research, the Montana gun company that Zinke owns shares in

By on • ( 20 Comments )

Source:  Wild Horse Freedom Federation

Then Congressman from Montana, Ryan Zinke, and Senator Steve Daines at the Safari Club International Convention in Las Vegas, Nevada. From left to right Ryan Zinke, Mike Degerness, Monty Howe, Scott Campbell, Dennis Hickman, John Clements and Steve Daines. (2/6/16)

by Debbie Coffey, V.P. and Dir. of Wild Horse Affairs, Wild Horse Freedom Federation

Records below indicate that on April 11, 2017, Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke spent half an hour with billionaire Forrest Lucas, owner of Lucas Oil, who is also the Founder and Executive Director of Protect the Harvest, a non-profit that is pushing for horse slaughter to be reinstated in the U.S.

Dave Duquette, an employee of Protect the Harvest, and Ramona Hage Morrison, a “property rights” advocate, were listed as “consultants” for Forrest Lucas.  Ramona Hage Morrison is the daughter of the late Wayne Hage, a leader of the “Sagebrush Rebellion” in Nevada.

Other attendees included Larry Murphy (CEO), KK Jense (President & Founder), John Clements (Dir. of Research & Development) of Proof Research, a company that manufactures and sells firearms, that was established in Zinke’s hometown of Whitefish, MT.  Also attending was Brian Kelly of BK Strategies, Proof Research’s registered lobbyist in Washington, D.C.

In a Huffington Post article titled “Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke Held Onto Undisclosed Shares in a Gun Company,” it states:

“PROOF Research Inc. was first established in 2011 in Zinke’s hometown of Whitefish, Montana, under the name Extreme Precision Armaments Inc., according to state of Montana business records.”

“Zinke provided consulting services for the company in 2012, according to local Montana news reports and a disclosure he filed as a candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives two years later listing $16,975 in compensation.”

READ THE REST OF THIS ARTICLE AND SEE DOCUMENTS HERE.

Categories: Horse News, Horse Slaughter, Wild Burros, Wild Horses/Mustangs

Tagged as: , , , , , , , ,

20 replies »

  1. Well, the fact that this took place at the Safari Club sort of says it all! Hits on everything that I feel strongly about – wild horses, of course, reducing the monuments, and apparently cozying up to part of the gun lobby!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  2. Does anyone believe Mr. Zinke wasn’t already acquainted with Lucas?

    The Safari Club meeting was held before he was Secretary and as an invester with his hometown business I don’t find this surprising. That he owns shares should have been disclosed before he was appointed to the DOI, but given the impressive conflicts of interests from his boss and family, I doubt this raises any eyebrows in DC. It’s also not news that hunting is legal in MT and most states, and is a significant economic engine for a lot of rural areas.

    I’m more troubled by the apparent freedom vested interests have to Zinke, while there seems to be no such access to non-profit or citizen interest groups. And just how much could anyone already “learn” about the wild horse and burro program in just half an hour? This sounds simply like an update between two powerful pro-slaughter interests on an agenda already well underway.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • Interesting to think America’s public lands are crop lands for a few private interests to “harvest” crops from. With over 325 million citizens, and only around 20,000 grazing permits, all in lands for which cattle can only be considered an introduced non-native species, and among all the legal areas cattle and sheep are allowed to graze on public lands, only a fraction are allowed to contain wild horses (and even then these are shared with typically far larger numbers of livestock), where is the equity? Why should millions of people support a few “harvesters” of the lifeblood of our public lands, at our loss and the gain of only a few?

      If huge herds of wild horses were rampaging through vast croplands across our country (as the over 6 million highly destructive and dangerous feral hogs already do) this argument might carry some weight, but the truth remains much simpler.

      Follow the money.

      Liked by 2 people

      Reply

      • Gosh amazing how that same number keeps popping up. ,<1% is the number of population to all permittees and ,<1% is the number of those permittees that are on wild horse or burro territory. Those 1% ers are Monsters with a lot of sniffers behind them with more sniffers behind them… My mind draws caricatures and the picture is not pretty.

        Like

    • My question has always been about the spay program is “If BLM was taken to court not to spay wild horses, How can they legally let their foundation contractor spay them.”

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  4. Interior Department Tapped Wildfire Preparedness Funds for Ryan Zinke Helicopter Tour
    By Celeste Katz 12/29/17

    The Department of the Interior (DOI) says it made a mistake by trying to use wildfire preparedness funds to pay for an unrelated helicopter tour of Nevada taken by Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke this summer.
    Officials initially said Zinke’s July 30 helicopter trip could be covered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the National Interagency Fire Center, a hub for the organization of response to wildfires—even though the secretary did not visit any fire zones that day, according to internal emails obtained by Newsweek.

    But after Newsweek questioned the line item, an Interior Department spokeswoman said this week that the chopper-listed in an accounting of Zinke’s travel as costing $39,295-“was charged to the account in error.” She added that the
    BLM would pay for the helicopter from “a more appropriate account.”
    http://www.newsweek.com/ryan-zinke-interior-department-helicopters-wildfires-757857

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  6. As if all that isn’t bad enough, their “discussions” are based on fraudulent WH&B populations provided to them by BLM.
    Here is another example of BLM’s fraudulent mathematics:

    Pre-gather Horses 2236 (exaggerated of course)
    Gathered 1637
    Post-gather 793
    (since when does 2236 minus 1637 equal 793?) Lies!
    (my calculator shows 2236 minus 1637 equals 599!)

    Pre-gather Burros 231 (exaggerated of course)
    Gathered 162
    Post-gather 160
    (since when does 231 minus 162 equal 160?) Lies!
    (my calculator shows 231 minus 162 equals 69!)

    Above from Twin Peaks HMA 2010 WH&B capture/removal data from BLM which they have now removed from the public (but I saved it).

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • It’s not a patent, really, but HSUS does have control over use of PZP on American wild horses:

      “Frequently asked questions

      The HSUS has been conducting wildlife contraception research for over 20 years and is confident that PZP is a valuable tool for the humane and efficient management of wild horses. We understand that, as with any new technology, those advocating for animals may be skeptical or concerned that PZP may have unintended consequences and The HSUS welcomes questions, observations and information regarding PZP. The following questions and concerns have recently been brought to our attention:
      1. Is The HSUS required to approve the use of PZP prior to the BLM using it in wild horse herds?

      Yes. Because The HSUS holds the Investigational New Animal Drug(INAD) exemption for PZP, we are required by law to approve the use of PZP on all wild horse herds
      2. Does The HSUS profit from the use of PZP?

      The HSUS and the Science and Conservation Center (SCC, the nonprofit organization that produces the drug) provides PZP at or below cost to our collaborators. Neither The HSUS nor the SCC profit from the use and sale of PZP.”

      http://www.humanesociety.org/issues/wild_horses/facts/hsus_wild_horse_management.html

      Like

      Reply

    • For me PZP is the cart before the horse and does have many questions still in investigation. The real reason I do not want these people to have any such tool or any tool for population control is they do not know how to use it. They have shown to use it means all the mares which is being done in Oregon and Utah (except in a few token herds that have community oversight). The reason it is not used in WY checkerboard and some in Nevada is they already have the mandate to Zero the herds and thus do not want to contaminate the captured. — It is the argument overused and in the way of the real argument “what overpopulation”.

      Like

      Reply

  8. From Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER)

    LEGAL CLOUD LOOMS OVER INTERIOR DEPARTMENT ACTIONS
    Legitimacy of Acting Directors of Parks, BLM, and Fish & Wildlife Remains in Doubt
    Posted on Mar 05, 2018

    “This legal shadow across the core of Interior is solely a product of Executive Branch dysfunction,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, noting that the GAO will now rule whether these temporary officials are in violation of the Vacancies Act. “Regardless of what GAO decides, this issue will be litigated in what could be scores of federal court cases challenging Interior decisions affecting endangered species, mining, drilling, grazing, and everything else these three agencies administer.”

    These three are among more than 200 presidential appointments for which there is still no nominee or even notice of intent to nominate. This list also includes Interior’s Assistant Secretary for Fish, Wildlife & Parks. Trump has repeatedly said that he does not intend to fill “a lot” of these positions because he believes they are unneeded. It is unclear if he intends to leave these four slots vacant for three more years.

    https://www.peer.org/news/news-releases/legal-cloud-looms-over-interior-department-actions.html

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  9. Here is another scary connection of Zinke “Buzzfeed reported that Trump was considering launching a new intelligence agency that some are calling a “private CIA.” Amyntor Group, the company that submitted the proposal, is a private contractor that provides intelligence and militia manpower to governments and corporations, and is based in Whitefish…” — I dated one of these Whitefish Cronies until one day he said to me “why waste that pretty (i was younger than) head trying to understand that book.” I grew up between Whitefish and Kalispell, neighbor to ex Gov. Schweitzer (not a crony) and did meet some pretty creepy people, and watched as some friends/family members fell under their spells. I went back and visited on my honeymoon and ended up at a bikers party — all they had to say was racist and cruel. How can one of the most beautiful places have some of the ugliest minds.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  10. WE KNOW TRUMP DIDN’T DO THIS. WE KNOW PROTECT THE HARVEST IS BEHIND THIS. Selling sick dogs and abused animals must be known and yet a completely redacted memo, every single word blackened to keep people from viewing inspections. Bear in mind, it also keeps Stores from reading about their breeders as well. It’s terrible they jeapordize WELFARE for a REDACTED report and then blame someone else. Protect the Harvest is a risk to BioSecuity by keeping contagious diseases, unsanitary, conditions, and results of inspections from people within the US.

    Like

    Reply

  11. From National Geographic

    We Asked the Government Why Animal Welfare Records Disappeared. They Sent 1,700 Blacked-Out Pages.

    By Natasha Daly
    and Rachael Bale
    PUBLISHED MAY 2017

    In January, the USDA deleted a public database that included inspection records from zoos, circuses, and research labs. In the agency’s response to our FOIA request, it still refuses to say why.

    They exposed abuses at roadside zoos, uncovered controversial government-funded animal experiments, and revealed the mistreatment of circus elephants. They confirmed dog breeders weren’t running puppy mills and that horse trainers weren’t exploiting their racers and jumpers. The records in U.S. Department of Agriculture’s online animal welfare database allowed journalists, investigators, and the public to look up inspection reports and violations of animal welfare laws.

    But nearly three months ago, the the USDA removed its database of animal abuse records from its public website, with no explanation.

    National Geographic wanted to know why. We filed a Freedom of Information Act request in February for records relating to the decision to take the database offline.

    In bold disregard for transparency, the department’s response Friday consisted of 1,771 pages of completely blacked-out documents.
    https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/05/usda-animal-welfare-records-foia-black-out-first-release/

    Like

    Reply

  12. From MUCKROCK

    This is a project to collaborate on filing requests regarding the Trump administration, with a particular focus on Donald J. Trump’s top political appointees and the information available to be gathered. The focus of these requests is not just the ongoing work of the administration, but also documents that highlight the background of various officials in the new administration, including the President himself.

    To join the project, send an email to michael@muckrock.com, or join us on Slack by entering your information here.
    https://www.muckrock.com/project/foia-the-trump-administration-85/

    Like

    Reply

Care to make a comment?

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.