Pressure grows on Oregon militia as former Bundy backers call for retreat

Some protesters have begun to leave Malheur wildlife refuge headquarters, as
onetime collaborator says leader Ammon Bundy should exit ‘the right way’

Sam Levin in Burns, Oregon
Monday 11 January 2016 18.46 GMT

As the armed siege of an eastern Oregon wildlife refuge entered its second week, the rightwing militia faced increasing pressure to surrender – including from former supporters of the occupation’s leader.

Ammon Bundy, the Nevada rancher who organized the takeover of the Malheur national wildlife refuge headquarters, avoided reporters all weekend as some of the protesters began to leave the occupation and as local residents and activists who had previously backed Bundy demanded that he and his militiamen retreat.

“We’re gonna figure some way to get him out,” Travis Williams, a 46-year-old Harney County rancher, told the Guardian on Saturday night. Williams had met and collaborated with Bundy last month in advance of a large rally to protest against the prosecution and imprisonment of local cattle ranchers Dwight Hammond and his son, Steven. But he and other local allies of Bundy were shocked when Bundy and fellow out-of-state men hijacked the protests and formed a heavily armed militia that seized a number of buildings at the federal wildlife sanctuary, located 30 miles away from the town of Burns

By Friday night, Williams and other Harney County residents who were previously aligned with Bundy were publicly requesting that the Nevada rancher and the rest of the occupiers leave the refuge and allow community representatives to take over the cause of fighting for increased local control of federally managed lands.

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