Ammon Bundy disconnects from Facebook after reacting to his remarks about the migrant caravan

Ammon Bundy was back in the news recently. 19659005] No, he is not involved in another armed confrontation with the federal government, as he was in 2016 as a leader of an armed takeover in a wildlife refuge of the United States. Oregon, and two years ago, a similar stalemate about grazing rights. cattle on federal land near his father's ranch in Nevada.

Bundy, one of the anti-government sentiment advocating Donald Trump's rise, made waves last week when he criticized the president for demonizing the migrant caravan on the southern border. The statements were striking for a personality so closely linked to the country's libertarian and anti-government right.

And on Friday, BuzzFeed News reported that Bundy "was leaving the militia movement" and was repressing his social media accounts because of the backlash that he received for his Trump reprimand. The story has had a lot of ink flowing, including: "Ammon Bundy leaves the militia movement in solidarity with Migrant Caravan".

Hit by phone on Friday, Bundy challenged BuzzFeed's story setting but acknowledged that he was frustrated with some elements. right-wing groups for which he has unofficially held the position of leader.

"I have never joined a movement," he said. "We were a family of breeders. We were on a ranch and the government came to take away our livelihood and we said no. It was nothing more than that.

He stated that the only real announcement he had made was that he was disconnecting from Facebook after being surprised by the angry response to his remarks about the caravan. His decision to speak came after his opinion was solicited on the issue and he tried to do some research to find out what he thought about it, he said.

"I have been asked several times to different people what I thought about to be honest with you, these caravans, which I did not know. I did not know the facts, "he said. "Then I started doing some research and trying to determine the facts."

[Cliven Bundy’s fight against the feds has roots in interpretation of Mormon scripture]

His verdict on the caravan, which he uttered in a 17-minute video at the time, broke abruptly with orthodoxy aligned with Trump on the subject. "Until mid-term elections, Trump repeatedly decried the caravan as an" invasion ", a threat to national security requiring the deployment of Emergency of thousands of US soldiers.

"He basically called them all criminals," said Bundy about Trump in the country. "Video." What about fathers, mothers, children who have come here and are ready to go through the asylum application process in order to enter this country and benefit from not having to be continually oppressed by criminals? " [19659014] Bundy, whose selective interpretation of Mormonism by the family underpins the anti-government vision of his members, said his views on migrants were partly motivated by his religion. He criticized the media coverage of the caravan, influenced by supporters, from right to left. Assertions that emigrants were paid by liberal philanthropist George Soros or had terrorists in their ranks were "a pile of rubbish".

The reaction was swift

Some former supporters who went to his father's ranch in 2014 BuzzFeed expressed regret during the armed confrontation with federal agents, while others went further, accusing Bundy of being paid by "globalists".

"The facts were rejected," Bundy told the Washington Post. "I could only see 99% of that was the same Trump rhetoric to call all these people terrorists. And they had chosen an isolated problem, and they said, "Oh, look, 40 of them charge the border, so all 5,000 are bad." … These refugees are not all the same. They did not come from the same places. They did not even come from the same country.

[Ammon Bundy breaks with Trump on anti-migrant rhetoric: ‘It’s all fear-based’]

Sam Jackson, assistant professor at the University of Albany College for Civil Protection, Homeland Security and Cyber ​​Security, who studies extremist extremism, s & # 39 asked whether Trump's treatment of migrants had been cut. close to a story that seems far too close for Mormons like Bundy. In the United States, followers of the religion were persecuted in the 1800s before looking for a new home in a part of North America that was then outside of the country's borders: l & rsquo; Utah.

"They Identify Abroad", Jackson

In his interview with The Post, Bundy stated that he felt smeared by the "liberals" of a similar to that experienced by migrants.

"They brought together all the hate and militia groups – they basically said that all those who come to help the Bundy are violent and anti-government militias," he said. "We are all We all make different choices, we all have agency power. "

Jackson said Bundy's remarks might confuse the Bundy Ranch's deadlock with anti-government groups and militias, sometimes The Anti-Defamation League, "The Patriotic Movement is a group of extremist movements and groups linked to the United States, whose ideologies are centered on the anti-government theories of conspiracy."

conflicts with the government, members of various groups – militias, sovereign citizens, anti-Muslim activists – united to the family to oppose what the federal government considered excessive,

Bundy expressed a reluctance towards its role. as a symbol for these groups in recent months. In October, he told The Associated Press that he hoped to spend more time with his wife and their six children.

"I will always have someone who calls me," Bundy said. "Life has never been the same, in a good and difficult way. I think it will take years and years to dissolve a bit. "

Supporting militia groups, who flocked to support armed clashes, in 2014 at Bundy's Cliven father's Nevada ranch, and in 2016 at the National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon, helped raise awareness of Bundy represent to a wider audience.

Bundy said that he did not expect that to change.

"I'm sure that they would come back to us, we would have even more people, and we would be even stronger, because they would be there for the right reasons: to defend property rights, the family and, basically, the foundations of this country, "he said.

his closing social media does not mean he'll stop fighting for what he believes.

"In free governments, people own land and resources. That's the battle, "he says. "I have every intention of launching the BLM [Bureau of Land Management] and the Forest Service, as well as Fish & Wildlife, out of the West, so that people can be free. Do not think that we will alleviate that.

He admits, however, that his decision to challenge Republican orthodoxy had weighed heavily. Bundy has made speeches in front of a right-wing public in recent years, on topics such as gun rights and the environment. In April, he told an audience in Modesto, California, that environmentalists were trying to "totally destroy the happiness of human life." for, what good is the fruit, "and shared an unsubstantiated theory that water regenerates on the earth with asteroid ice, according to Modesto Bee. Bundy said that his speeches about migrants could undermine his language engagement.

"I will probably not be invited a lot," he said.

Nevertheless, he said, he was happy to be released from the management of his Facebook page. , on which it has more than 20,000 subscribers and leaves social media in general.

"No longer having to do it will be a relief," he said.

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