Ammon Bundy, the leader of the occupation at an federal wildlife refuge in Oregon, released a new statement from jail through his lawyers on Monday.
In the statement recorded on Saturday and published on YouTube by his lawyers on Monday, Bundy called on state lawmakers to visit their constituents in prison and protect their rights to free speech from the federal government.
“This is a call to action for any elected representative in Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Wyoming, Utah, Arizona, the State of Washington, and Ohio. You have constituents in federal custody. Please visit and contact them to voice your support for free speech, the right to assemble, and civil disobedience,” Bundy said in the statement. “It is your duty to hold federal agencies at bay, protecting the people in your state,” he continued in his statement to state officials.
“And to those who disagree with my speech, or our civil disobedience, and may dislike our ideas regarding that the land belongs to the people: Please remember that you do not want free speech to be retaliated against by government officials. If you do not advocate for government to tolerate ideas that it hates, then the First Amendment and free speech mean nothing,” he continued. “Arm yourself with ideas. Arm yourselves with education. Argue and disagree. Be free.”
Bundy has released several statements through his lawyer since he was arrested in January.
In a statement read by Mike Arnold, one of his attorneys, shortly after his arrest, Bundy called on his fellow militiamen to leave the refuge and go home. In a recording released late last week, Bundy told the Oregon State Police and the FBI to go home.
Bundy and 15 others linked to the occupation at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge were indicted by a federal grand jury for conspiracy to impede officers of the United States. Four of the militiamen named still remain at the refuge, according to The Oregonian.
Listen to Bundy’s latest statement:
Is it possible to sentence people to education? I don’t mean a six-week traffic school kind of thing, I mean like force somebody to either get a four-year degree from a decent school–on the state’s dime, no less–or else go to prison?
And those people are the Paiute, Nez Perce, and Chinook.
The State of Oregon never owned that land; the feds took it directly from the native inhabitants.
But thanks for playing. Johnny Olson has some lovely parting gifts for you and your cellmates.
I’m assuming you are talking about the lawyer who would orchestrate this?
So lemme get this straight: if the Federal government doesn’t take kindly to a bunch of armed men taking over a public building by force, destroying federal property, and threatening townspeople in their place of work and at their homes, there’s no freedom of speech?
When you occupy part of a country, insist that you do not recognize the authority of the government and promise to resist by force any one who comes to remove you you are a lot closer to the definition of treason than you are to free speech.