Dept Of Interior Kicks American Bison Off Public Land In Montana … from Crooks & Liars Ed Scarce

If there’s anything that more symbolizes the moral bankruptcy of this administration, I don’t know what it is.

American Prairie’s director of public affairs Beth Saboe notes that of the 600,000 acres managed by American Prairie, approximately 500,000 acres are being leased back to cattle ranchers. But it seems like that’s not enough, and they want 100% of the public land for their cattle.

Source: Outdoor Life

The U.S. Department of the Interior has said it will revoke the grazing permits that have allowed American Prairie to run bison on roughly 63,000 acres of federal public land in Montana. This decision would affect seven parcels managed by the Bureau of Land Management in Phillips County, and it would hinder the organization’s larger goals of conserving large swaths of intact grasslands while restoring the native grazers to those landscapes.

The Interior’s rationale for yanking the permits, according to its Jan. 16 proposed decision, is that under the Taylor Grazing Act, the BLM can only issue grazing permits for livestock managed for “production-oriented” purposes. It claims that American Prairie’s emphasis on conservation runs counter to those purposes.

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