Independent Review Confirms: BLM Lacks Justification to Remove Wild Horses Near Carson City

Independent Review Confirms: BLM Lacks Justification to Remove Wild Horses Near Carson City

Community Calls Upon BLM to Cancel Auction Event for Captured Horses and to Meet with Local Community on Solutions

Carson City, Nevada – March 18, 2013 – Today, responding to the independent confirmation that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lacked evidence to support the removal of a small family of wild horses in Carson City, the American Wild Horse Conservation (formerly American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign), a national coalition, and local community members are calling on the BLM to cancel the planned March 23 auction of the horses.

In light of the new evidence, the advocates also called for the BLM to re-evaluate the return of the horses to the range, an option the agency had previously rejected.

An independent investigative and fact-checking article published on Sunday in the Reno Gazette Journal examined whether the BLM "was justified in removing a family of wild horses off Deer Run Road near Carson City." In the investigative piece published in the well-regarded “Fact Checker” column, reporter Mark Robison examined each of the BLM claims created to justify the agency's removal of the horses. He concluded:

The public and the horses themselves deserved a more defensible level of justification for their removal from the BLM. Even if the BLM is right that removing individual horses when problems arise doesn’t keep problems from ever happening again — and it is — that doesn’t justify removal of related horses who residents hadn’t complained about.

"Now that the BLM allegations about these wild horses have been exposed as false, the agency must cancel the currently scheduled auction of the horses and meet in earnest with the community on a solution that works for the horses and the community,” said Annie Jantzen, a local community organizer. "This small wild horse family is like family to us. They have been a part of our community and our lives for decades. The BLM has no excuse for taking these horses away from their home, since it has now been shown that they have never caused any problems."

"The BLM still has the opportunity to do the right thing and work with the community to release these horses to the range," said Deniz Bolbol, AWHC communications director.

Recently the Humane Society of the U.S (HSUS) joined the call for the release of the small family of wild horses to the range. The AWHC has outlined the BLM’s erroneous rational for removing the horses and the opportunities to work with the local community to safely return the horses to the range.

The American Wild Horse Conservation (formerly American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign) (AWHC) is a coalition of more than 50 horse advocacy, public interest, and conservation organizations dedicated to preserving the American wild horse in viable, free-roaming herds for generations to come.