Ammon Bundy’s Predictable Journey From Militia Zealot to Anti-Mask Martyr

No one is more committed to the principle of not wearing a mask than Ammon Bundy. 

True to form, the anti-government militant son of cattle rancher Cliven Bundy was arrested Monday in Idaho after he refused to wear a mask to court. He was there to face charges—you guessed it—of trespassing and resisting arrest while leading anti-mask protests last year. 

Bundy was arrested twice in two days last August during anti-mask protests at the Idaho State Capitol in Boise. Both times, Bundy refused to leave state legislative chambers and ultimately had to be wheeled out of the building.

After Bundy refused to wear a mask into the courthouse, he was arrested and charged with missing a court appearance, according to CNN. His bond was set at $10,000. People’s Rights, a network Bundy helped start in 2020 to link opponents to coronavirus, said in an email to VICE News that Bundy was “willing to attend” his trial and that he was arrested outside of the courthouse.

“Their right to a speedy and just trial of their peers is not subject to (nor can be denied) based upon what is worn (or not) on their face,” People’s Rights said. “Their rights are being violated, and they (including others in attendance at the time) are currently being held unjustly.”

The fight over masks isn’t Bundy’s first rodeo, however. Over the past several years he’s become one of the most prominent anti-government activists in the country. So who is he?

Bundy is part of a family that has become famous for protesting against what they perceive as bloated government. His father, 74-year-old Cliven Bundy, is a rancher who has had several standoffs with law enforcement. 

For more than two decades, Cliven Bundy refused to pay fees to the federal Bureau of Land Management for his livestock grazing on federal land. This dispute came to a head when the BLM began seizing Bundy’s cattle. Bundy responded by initiating an armed standoff between his supporters and federal agents, in which Ammon Bundy participated. During the standoff, Ammon Bundy blocked a dump truck with his ATV and was tasered after kicking a police dog.

During the standoff, Cliven Bundy notably made virulently racist comments suggesting that Black people were better off under the system of slavery. 

“'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?” Cliven Bundy said of a Black family he once saw in Las Vegas. “They didn’t get no more freedom. They got less freedom.”

The standoff was defused, but Cliven Bundy was later arrested and charged with multiple felonies, including intent to commit conspiracy against the United States and assault on a federal law enforcement officer. The charges were ultimately dismissed by a federal judge for “flagrant” prosecutorial misconduct, however, and an appeal to refile the charges was denied by an appeals court last year. 

Continuing the family business in early 2016, Ammon Bundy and his brother Ryan rose to prominence during a standoff at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon, after they led an armed takeover of the refuge’s headquarters. 

The impetus for the takeover and standoff was the sentencing of ranchers Dwight and Steven Hammond on federal arson charges. Former President Donald Trump pardoned the Hammonds in 2018.

The occupation began on January 2, 2016, and on January 26 an FBI shootout resulted in agents shooting and killing Robert LaVoy Finicum during a shootout. Ryan Bundy suffered a minor gunshot wound. Ammon Bundy was arrested that day and later urged occupiers to go home, but the occupation lasted a total of 41 days.

Later that year, Ammon and Ryan Bundy were acquitted on the charges. 

In recent years, the younger Bundy has continued to speak out against what he views as government abuses, even speaking in support of the Black Lives Matter movement and calls to defund the police last year. 

“You must have a problem in your mind if you think that somehow the Black Lives Matter is more dangerous than the police,” he said in a Facebook video last July. “You must have a problem in your mind if you think that antifa is the one going to take your freedom. You must be hypnotized.”

But since the pandemic began, Bundy has largely focused on attacking restrictions and mandates to stop the spread of COVID-19. His activism has sometimes been bizarre, like in October when he refused to wear a mask to a high school football game and the game had to be ended at halftime because of it. 

But it’s also taken a darker turn. 

Bundy started People’s Rights last year, and by October had built it into a network with 153 “assistants” in more than a dozen states, according to a report by the Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights. 

The organization has tens of thousands of members and has sponsored more than 50 demonstrations, the Los Angeles Times reported last month. Facebook removed multiple People’s Rights groups from its platform last year after labeling it a “militarized social movement,” according to the Times. 

The group connects anti-government activists together and builds support for demonstrations. Bundy associate Nicholas Ramlow said last year that the group was looking to make the network “the first Uber-like” militia response system, which he referred to as “protective response.” 

In December, the Idaho Press reported that during a People’s Rights meeting in Idaho, Bundy told attendees that they needed to prepare “before the world comes to an end” and encouraged people to train in small groups for effective “warfare.” 

After his second arrest last August, Idaho police banned Bundy from entering the State Capitol for a year.