BLM Says American Prairie's Bison Can No Longer Graze on Public Lands

[CentralMass]

https://www.outdoorlife.com/conservation/blm-revokes-american-prairie-bison-permits/
"The U.S. Department of the Interior has said it will revoke the grazing permits that have allowed American Prairie to run bison on roughly 63,000 acres of federal public land in Montana. This decision would affect seven parcels managed by the Bureau of Land Management in Phillips County, and it would hinder the organization’s larger goals of conserving large swaths of intact grasslands while restoring the native grazers to those landscapes.

The Interior’s rationale for yanking the permits, according to its Jan. 16 proposed decision, is that under the Taylor Grazing Act, the BLM can only issue grazing permits for livestock managed for “production-oriented” purposes. It claims that American Prairie’s emphasis on conservation runs counter to those purposes.
American Prairie CEO Alison Fox criticized this reasoning as both unfair and inconsistent with long-standing public-lands grazing practices in Montana. She said in a response to the decision that it creates uncertainty, not just for American Prairie — which has been grazing bison using federal leases since 2005 — but for all other livestock owners in the West. She added that American Prairie plans to protest the decision and will take further legal action, if necessary.

“This is a slippery slope,” Fox said in a statement shared with Outdoor Life. “When federal agencies begin changing how the rules are applied after the process is complete, it undermines confidence in the system for everyone who relies on public lands. Montana livestock owners deserve clarity, fairness, and decisions they can count on.”
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Saboe explains that of the 600,000 acres in Montana that American Prairie manages, over 500,000 acres are being leased back to local cattle ranchers. The vast majority of the organization’s habitat base is public land, and American Prairie’s long-term goal is to stitch together both public and private holdings to establish a sprawling conservation reserve benefitting wildlife, ranchers, and the American public. "