Harney County Sheriff Dave Ward announced his decision to resign on Dec. 31 in an opinion piece published Wednesday in the Burns Times-Herald. Ward was sheriff in 2016 when armed protesters angry about federal control of Western lands overtook the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in the remote county and stayed there for weeks. These are not frivolous expenditures; they are duties and responsibilities of the sheriff, mandated by law,” he wrote. Standoff spokesman Robert “Lavoy” Finicum was shot and killed by Oregon State Police. Federal charges were dropped in 2018 against the Bundy brothers and their father, Cliven Bundy, in a 2014 standoff in Nevada over a roundup of Bundy cattle.

Source: National Post April 18, 2019 23:48 UTC