In late 2019, a routine inspection by the U.S. Forest Service on federal lands in Montana ignited a multi-year dispute, exposing the profound political pressures that often complicate the enforcement of grazing regulations across the American West. Two local ranchers, operating under a permit to graze their cattle, faced a notice of noncompliance after agency staff documented repeated violations, including cattle found in unauthorized areas four times during September alone. Further investigations revealed dilapidated fences and improperly placed salt licks too close to vital creeks and springs, drawing livestock into sensitive riparian habitats. These habitats, crucial for water quality, biodiversity, and wildlife, are particularly vulnerable to overgrazing and trampling. The Forest Service, after numerous attempts at communication, formally accused the ranchers of a "willful and intentional violation" of their permit, warning that future breaches could lead to its revocation – a serious threat to their livelihood.

Despite not being among the largest or most politically connected permit holders, the ranchers quickly garnered significant support, illustrating a broader pattern of influence in public lands management. They contested the agency’s warning, asserting that "The Forest Service needs to work with us and understand that grazing on the Forest is not black and white," arguing for a more flexible interpretation of rules. Conversely, the acting district ranger maintained that his staff had "gone above and beyond" to assist the ranchers in achieving compliance. With the strategic assistance of a former Forest Service employee, the ranchers leveraged their connections, reaching out to their congressional representatives in early 2020. This intervention by then-Representative Greg Gianforte and Senator Steve Daines, both Republicans representing Montana, initiated over a year of intense back-and-forth communication between the senator’s office and Forest Service officials. An internal email from a Forest Service official in 2021 candidly captured the frustration, noting that when ranchers "hear something they don’t like," they often bypass local channels, running "to the forest supervisor and the senator’s office to get what they want."

Public lands ranching represents one of the most extensive land uses across many Western states, where cattle often outnumber people, intertwining economic activity with a deeply ingrained cultural identity. This strong connection translates into remarkable political responsiveness, even for permittees of modest means. Ranchers facing citations or resisting regulations frequently mobilize a network of allies, including pro-grazing lawyers, powerful trade group lobbyists, and sympathetic politicians ranging from county commissioners to state legislators and U.S. senators like Daines. These influential figures, some of whom have ascended to high-level positions within federal administrations, have consistently advocated for loosening environmental regulations and, in certain instances, reducing the consequences for those who violate existing rules.

Numerous current and former employees of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Forest Service have anonymously revealed the substantial obstacles posed by these powerful ranching allies to the effective enforcement of grazing regulations. The fear of political backlash often leads regulators to compromise or retreat. One BLM employee, requesting anonymity due to concerns about retaliation, stated, "If we do anything anti-grazing, there’s at least a decent chance of politicians being involved. We want to avoid that, so we don’t do anything that would bring that about." Mary Jo Rugwell, a former director of the BLM’s Wyoming state office, acknowledged that while most ranchers adhere to regulations, a problematic minority "break the rules and go above and around you to try to get what they want or think they deserve." She underscored that ranching interests "can be very closely tied to folks that are in power."

Since 2020, congressional members from both political parties have communicated with the BLM and Forest Service on grazing issues more than 20 times, according to agency communication logs obtained through public records requests. Beyond Daines and Gianforte, this list includes Representatives Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) and former Representative Yvette Herrell (R-N.M.), alongside Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah), among others. Their inquiries often centered on themes such as "Request for Flexibility with Grazing Permits" and the "Public Lands Rule Impact on Ranchers and Rural Communities," highlighting a widespread concern among elected officials regarding federal land use policies. Rick Danvir, a long-time wildlife manager on a large Utah ranch, added another layer of complexity, noting that the BLM faces pressure not only from ranching interests but also from litigious environmental organizations opposed to public-lands grazing, leaving the agency in a "defensive crouch" to avoid costly court battles.

In the Montana case, Senator Daines’ office maintained a relentless stream of emails to Forest Service officials from March 2020 through February 2021, demanding detailed information about the agency’s interactions with the ranchers. The pressure escalated to the point where a Daines staffer appeared unannounced at a meeting between the ranchers and the Forest Service in April 2021, though they were turned away. These interventions, however, visibly impacted local Forest Service officials. While constituent services are a fundamental duty of elected representatives, officials involved in the dispute expressed deep concern that the external political pressure was compelling them to afford the ranchers special treatment. One Forest Service official wrote in 2020, "If this issue was solely between the (ranger district) and the permittee, we should administer the permit and end the discussion there. Unfortunately, we have regional, state and national oversight from others that deters us from administering the permit like we would for others. It is very unfair to the top notch operators that call/coordinate/manage consistently." Another official articulated the frustration: "It leaves a sour taste to think I am expected to hold all other permittees to the terms of their permits/forest plan/forest handbook… yet be told to continually let it go with another."

By June 2020, the acting district ranger conceded a willingness to "cut (the ranchers) some slack" in hopes of improving relations. Despite finding evidence of overgrazing that could lead to declining vegetation and soil health in December 2020, the agency refrained from issuing another formal notice of noncompliance. By late 2022, the Montana ranchers had been in violation of their permit for four consecutive years, warranting yet another notice. However, agency staff were increasingly wary of the anticipated conflict and the broader political ramifications. Ultimately, the Forest Service declined to officially recommend a citation in its year-end report for 2022, despite widespread signs of overuse on the grazing land, confirming the observation of one official that "the drama continues." A spokesperson for Daines affirmed the senator’s commitment to "advocates tirelessly on behalf of his constituents to federal agencies" and expressed satisfaction in having "advocated" for the ranchers.

The current political landscape further solidifies the position of ranchers seeking reduced federal oversight. The administration has appointed Karen Budd-Falen, a self-described "cowboy lawyer" with a background in aggressively challenging federal grazing regulations, to a high-level post at the U.S. Department of the Interior. Budd-Falen, who comes from a prominent ranching family and holds a stake in a large Wyoming cattle ranch, has a long history of litigating against the federal government, famously using the anti-corruption RICO law to sue individual BLM staffers over enforcement (a case she ultimately lost at the Supreme Court in 2007). Her past legal work also includes representing organizations supporting Utah’s failed 2024 lawsuit to gain control of millions of acres of federal land within its borders, aligning her with the "Sagebrush Rebellion" ideology that advocates for greater state and local control over federal lands. Similarly, Michael Boren, a tech entrepreneur and rancher with a contentious history with the Forest Service – including a cease-and-desist letter in 2024 for allegedly clearing national forest land and building a private cabin – was nominated as undersecretary of agriculture for natural resources and environment at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, a position overseeing the Forest Service. His confirmation in October signals a clear direction for federal land management.

The new administration has swiftly moved to dismantle Biden-era reforms aimed at strengthening environmental protections for public rangelands. In September, the administration proposed rescinding the "Public Lands Rule," a significant policy finalized in May 2024. This rule sought to elevate the protection and restoration of wildlife habitat and clean water to equal footing with traditional extractive uses like oil drilling, mining, and grazing on federal land. It also intended to allow individuals, organizations, tribes, and state agencies to lease BLM land for conservation purposes and enhance the BLM’s process for analyzing the environmental impact of economic activities. Additionally, the Trump administration effectively nullified a Biden-era BLM memo that prioritized environmental review for grazing lands identified as environmentally degraded or situated in sensitive wildlife habitats. The Interior Department and BLM, in a statement, maintained that "any policy decisions are made in accordance with federal law and are designed to balance economic opportunity with conservation responsibilities across the nation’s public lands."

Concurrent with these policy reversals, the administration is pursuing a broad initiative to open vacant federal grazing lands to ranchers, positioning "grazing as a central element of federal land management." While 24 million acres of vacant grazing land exist nationwide, many of these allotments are temporarily without livestock for critical ecological reasons, such as recovery from wildfires, insufficient water or forage to sustain cattle, or ongoing efforts to remove invasive species. Despite these ecological considerations, Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz, in May, gave staff a tight two-week deadline to compile lists of unused grazing allotments suitable for rapid restocking, a move that directly aligns with the policy objectives of organizations like the Public Lands Council, which advocates for swiftly filling vacant allotments. A USDA spokesperson clarified that "Vacant grazing allotments have always been open and available to permitted grazing," yet the renewed urgency and policy shifts indicate a significant change in emphasis.

The tensions over public lands grazing are not new. Decades before the current administration, presidential efforts to increase grazing fees or strengthen regulations consistently faced fierce opposition from ranching interests. In the mid-1990s, the Clinton administration famously retreated from a proposal to raise fees amidst widespread outcry from public-lands ranchers and their Republican allies in Congress. Many in the industry viewed then-Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt’s proposed reforms as an existential threat, with one rancher at a hearing on the failed push declaring, "The government is trying to take our livelihood, our rights and our dignity. We can’t live with it."

While ranching industry groups may not command the same lobbying budgets as pharmaceutical or oil and gas giants, their perspective resonates powerfully in the Capitol. J.R. Simplot Co., the largest holder of BLM grazing permits, spent approximately $610,000 lobbying Congress between 2020 and 2025 and recently hired the Bernhardt Group, founded by David Bernhardt, former Interior Secretary during the first Trump administration. Permittees with fewer resources often rely on influential trade groups like the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA), which boasts affiliates in 40 states. In recent years, the NCBA and its allies have initiated lawsuits against the Environmental Protection Agency over Biden-era water regulations (Waters of the U.S. rule) and the Interior Department regarding endangered species protections for the lesser prairie chicken. The association, representing both public-lands ranchers and the broader beef industry, expended nearly $2 million lobbying in Washington, D.C., over the past five years and contributed more than $2 million to federal candidates and political action committees in the last two election cycles, with over 90% of its political contributions in 2024 directed to Republicans. The NCBA vociferously opposed the Public Lands Rule, even filing a lawsuit to halt its implementation before the Trump administration moved to rescind it, with then-president Mark Eisele calling the rule "a stepping stone to removing livestock grazing from our nation’s public lands." Nada Culver, a former deputy director of the BLM during the Biden administration, noted that the political influence of ranchers extends beyond mere lobbying and campaign donations; it is "tied to their cultural power," as they are perceived as "icons of the American West."

Beyond federal political channels, state and local officials, including legislators, county commissioners, and sheriffs, frequently intervene on behalf of ranchers encountering difficulties with federal land agencies. In June 2019, during a protracted dispute between a group of ranchers and employees of Utah’s Fishlake National Forest, a forest supervisor recounted a rancher’s threat after being told he would receive a citation for non-compliance: "He then said if anyone in his family got hurt by this, remember I have a family and they can get hurt too." In this same dispute, a local sheriff reportedly expressed willingness to jail Forest Service personnel, echoing the infamous 2014 standoff between rancher Cliven Bundy and the BLM in Bunkerville, Nevada. Minutes from a January 2016 Piute County Commission meeting recorded the sheriff stating "he will not allow this to be a Bundy situation. If that entails jailing the forest service he will do it!!!"

In a few extreme cases, ranchers who violated grazing regulations have resorted to armed resistance without losing political support. The Bundy family’s Bunkerville standoff epitomized this, following two decades of chronic trespassing that accumulated approximately $1 million in grazing fines and unpaid fees. Cliven Bundy maintained, without legal basis, that the U.S. government lacked jurisdiction over grazing on Nevada’s public lands. When federal agents attempted to round up the trespassing cattle with a court order, Bundy and armed supporters engaged in a standoff, ultimately leading to the agents’ retreat. Bundy famously declared, "I’ll be damned if I’m going to honor a federal court that has no jurisdiction or authority or arresting power over we the people." Throughout this perilous confrontation, the Bundy family received support from numerous political figures across the region, including resolutions from Nye County commissioners and endorsements from Nevada and Arizona state legislators. The Bundys’ political ties have only strengthened, with Celeste Maloy, Cliven Bundy’s niece, elected to represent Utah’s 2nd Congressional District in 2023. Maloy has since advocated for the sale of federal lands and sponsored legislation to facilitate ranchers’ access to vacant grazing allotments during droughts, receiving $20,000 in campaign contributions from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association during the 2024 election cycle.

The ecological consequences of political interference are starkly illustrated by the experience of Wayne Werkmeister, a long-time BLM employee who retired in 2022 after a career overseeing federal grazing lands. Werkmeister described the immense difficulty of enforcing public-lands protections when "everything stacked against you, when you’ve got political pressure on you, when you’ve got management who doesn’t want to hear it, when you’ve got a rancher who’s trying to prove himself, it’s nearly impossible." In 2017, after intensive on-the-ground research, Werkmeister and his colleagues determined that two ranchers near Grand Junction, Colorado, were severely damaging habitat across a 90,000-acre allotment grazed by approximately 500 cattle. Werkmeister initiated efforts to reduce the cattle numbers to allow the land to recover. In response, the ranchers engaged former BLM employees to challenge the agency’s findings, accusing it of "agenda driven bullying," and copied then-U.S. Senator Cory Gardner, a Colorado Republican, on their correspondence. Werkmeister found himself justifying the agency’s actions to the senator’s aides. In October 2018, Werkmeister’s office received a letter from the Budd-Falen Law Offices, representing the ranchers, asserting that the BLM’s actions "could potentially and unnecessarily force them out of business." This letter was also sent to local county commissioners, amplifying the political pressure. Werkmeister’s superiors subsequently ordered him back into the field to gather more data, despite years of existing documentation on the allotment’s condition, precipitation patterns, and grazing history. Ultimately, Werkmeister was never able to implement sufficient grazing reductions to facilitate the allotment’s recovery. As recently as 2024, agency records confirm continued grazing reapproval. Werkmeister considers this inability to restore the parcel’s ecological health among his biggest professional failures, noting during a recent visit the denuded ground and remnants of native bunchgrasses struggling amidst a pervasive spread of invasive cheatgrass, describing it as "Overgrazed to the point of gone." This degradation underscores the critical environmental cost when political influence overrides scientific land management principles.