Voting Station

Cliven Bundy

Please vote to return to collections.

Farmer

The Resume

    (1946- )
    Born in Bunkerville, Nevada
    Nevada cattle rancher
    Regularly grazed cattle on federally administered land
    Refused to renew his permit as a protest against new Bureau of Land Management (BLM) policies (1993)
    Lost multiple court cases against the federal government (1998-2012)
    BLM began a roundup of trespassing cattle (April 5, 2014)
    After confrontations of Bundy supporters with federal officials and law enforcement, BLM suspended the roundup and returned already seized cattle to Bundy (April 12, 2014)

Why he might be annoying:

    He likes posing for photo ops with the American flag, even though he refuses to recognize the authority of the American government.
    He racked up over a million dollars in unpaid grazing fees and court ordered fines. (For comparison, the 1100 ranchers in Oregon who use federal lands for grazing cattle had a collective total of $18,760 in past due BLM payments.)
    Oddly, most of his supporters were the type of right wing pundit who screams bloody murder when a welfare recipient wrangles a couple of extra food stamps.
    He claims to have 'pre-emptive grazing rights' on the land because his family had kept cattle there since 1877.
    In reality, his parents bought the ranch in 1946. (But what's seven decades between friends?)
    He demanded that the Clark County Sheriff disarm all federal agents and hand their weapons over to Bundy within an hour, and was actually shocked when the sheriff failed to do so (April 12, 2014).
    He decided to tell a New York Times reporter 'one more thing I know about the Negro': 'They abort their young children, they put their young men in jail, because they never learned how to pick cotton.... And I’ve often wondered, are they better off as slaves, picking cotton and having a family life and doing things, or are they better off under government subsidy?' (April 19, 2014)

Why he might not be annoying:

    During the confrontations with the BLM, some members of his family were tasered.
    Ultimately, cooler heads prevailed, avoiding another Waco or Ruby Ridge.
    When an interviewer pointed out that he was using government resources without paying, he conceded, 'I might be a welfare queen.'
    His supporters -- Rand Paul, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, et al. -- dropped him like a hot potato once his musings on blacks and slavery went public.

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 19 Votes: 84.21% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 82 Votes: 54.88% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 96 Votes: 65.62% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 593 Votes: 51.10% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 7 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 24 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 3 Votes: 66.67% Annoying
    In 2016, Out of 13 Votes: 30.77% Annoying
    In 2015, Out of 34 Votes: 64.71% Annoying
    In 2014, Out of 93 Votes: 46.24% Annoying