Hundreds of Armed Right-Wing Militia Members Take Over Federal Building

Bundy's message: "We don't need that. We don't want it and we're asking you to leave," MacFarlane told reporters at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.

They're [Bundy's group] "alarmed" by the arrival of Pacific Patriot Network members, some carrying rifles, and concerned about the perception they convey.

The Pacific Patriots Network has previously said that while it agrees with Bundy's land rights grievances, it does not support the occupation, a position leader Brandon Rapolla reiterated during the meeting.

The militia members are not joining the occupation, but are sleeping in their vehicles or in hotels in Burns, he said. Rapolla said he had also taken sausage McMuffins to FBI agents who are stationed at nearby Burns Municipal Airport to monitor the occupation and had coffee with deputies from the county sheriff's office on Thursday.

The meetings were friendly, he said, and he told them that they were there to make neither side escalates the dispute. "That's really the point of militias: it's community involvement," Rapolla said. "If something happens in your community, that's what militias are for."

Bundy thanked Rapolla and handed him a small roll of bills, which he said came from donations. "We're friends, but we're operating separately," Rapolla, a former Marine who helped defend the Bundys in 2014 in their standoff with the U.S. government at their Nevada ranch, told Reuters in an earlier interview.

There's a 6-7 minute video of the talk at that site. The Sheriff starts off by saying that "there's been some positive stuff that's come out of this...I've talked to congressmen, senators, governors...I think the people of the country are excited about working out issues that come from government overreach."

I need to clean an engine part."

. . . Bundy and his crew have already accomplished the primary goal on this
stunt, to wit: To draw more national attention to the ongoing conflicts
between the feds and local government/inhabitants in the Western States.
. . .

Was not the moved bombing done in the 1970s?

Ammon Bundy is not a terrorist: The authorities are waiting out the militia — just as they should do with Black Lives Matter protesters

To be sure, there are similarities with Islamic militant groups. For instance, while Bundy’s “resistance movement” is essentially driven by socio-political issues, chiefly land rights and perceived overreach by the federal government, their campaign is also religiously framed and motivated. This same dynamic holds true for ISIS, al-Qaida and related groups. Moreover, Bundy and his associates hold views that most would consider extreme. In fact, they share ISIS’ admiration for slavery—with Cliven Bundy (Ammon’s father, and the head of the Bundy clan) having suggested that blacks may be better off today if they were still in chains; others from the militia are known members of designated hate groups and extremist organizations. Finally, as with al-Qaida, militants who drew inspiration from the Bundys have carried out atrocities that the family itself had to disavow.

However, any similarities between the Citizens for Constitutional Freedom and Islamic terrorists are vastly outweighed by the differences between them.

For instance, the militia is not threatening violence, nor even to deface or destroy federal property, if their demands are not met; the only consequence is continued occupation. In the interim, they are being careful not to damage the refuge or its facilities, they have allowed the public to come and go largely unrestricted, and have even claimed that they will vacate the premises if it seems clear that the local population wants them to go. And so, while it is illegal for the militia to be occupying the Malheur Refuge, their actions would be better understood as an act of civil disobedience than an act of terror.

Granted, Bundy and his supporters are heavily armed. However, there is no evidence that their weapons were illegally obtained, are unlicensed, or are otherwise unlawful—and in the United States there is a constitutional right to bear arms. Clearly, the purpose of the guns is to deter the authorities from raiding them, and consistent with previous standoffs, Bundy has threatened violence if there is any attempt to forcibly dismantle or dislodge their demonstration. However, there is no evidence that they are seeking out this kind of escalation.

Musa al-Gharbi is a political philosopher affiliated with the Southwest Initiative for the Study of Middle East Conflict (SISMEC).

It almost goes without saying that were a group of Muslim Americans to stockpile military weaponry, form a militia and then seize a government facility—perhaps demanding justice for the torture of U.S. citizens, indefinitely detaining U.S. citizens without trial or executing U.S. citizens without due process (all unconstitutional practices carried out predominantly against Muslims)—such a militia would immediately be branded as, and treated like, a terrorist organization...

.... here’s the takeaway: Muslims and other minority groups should be empowered to engage in the political sphere just as robustly, dynamically or even confrontationally as their white counterparts—and with the expectation that authorities will respect their rights, exercise the same level of restraint, and extend the same benefit of doubt that the Citizens for Constitutional Freedom have received....