After his standoff with federal officers, the I-Team at KLAS-TV has conducted an in-depth investigation of rancher Cliven Bundy’s claim to “ancestral rights” on the Virgin River Valley.
The I-Team reports it “dug into century-old records to examine Bundy’s claims,” and it seems his claim might not have legitimacy.
Bundy explained his “ancestral rights” to the I-Team:
“I’ve lived my lifetime here. My forefathers have been up and down the Virgin Valley here ever since 1877. All these rights that I claim, have been created through pre-emptive rights and beneficial use of the forage and the water and the access and range improvements.”
[…]
“My rights are before the BLM even existed, but my rights are created by beneficial use. Beneficial use means we created the forage and the water from the time the very first pioneers come here.”
However, as the I-Team discovered: “Clark County property records show Cliven Bundy’s parents moved from Bundyville, Arizona and bought the 160 acre ranch in 1948 from Raoul and Ruth Leavitt.”
Water rights were transferred too, but only to the ranch, not the federally managed land surrounding it. Court records show Bundy family cattle didn’t start grazing on that land until 1954.
The Bureau of Land Management was created 1946, the same year Cliven was born.
You can review the I-Team’s in-depth look at the genealogy and property records and you can watch a new clip on their findings, below.
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