Faced with criticism for his inflammatory language, such as calling environmental organizations terrorists, Garfield County Commissioner Leland Pollock refuses to walk back his remarks.
Garfield County hosted a meeting in Tropic on Oct. 26, to talk about, and rally opposition against, the Bureau of Land Management’s proposed draft management plan for the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.
At the meeting, which was attended by county officials and residents, Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes, and Redge Johnson, executive director of the state Public Lands Policy Coordinating Office, Pollock took aim at the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) and other environmentalist groups for allegedly harassing ranchers and destroying their way of life.
Pollock and others contend the draft Resource Management Plan, which the Biden administration required the BLM to draft after reversing former President Donald Trump’s reductions to the size of the Grand Staircase, could wipe out grazing, bankrupt ranchers and farmers, close some roads and stop ATV use, and eliminate target shooting.
“I call these special interest groups like SUWA and Western Watershed and the Grand Canyon Trust our al-Qaida” Pollock told residents. “They are like our terror cell because they are constantly litigating us.”
Pollock’s vitriol was especially focused on SUWA, which he called the “scum of the planet.”
“These terror organizations like SUWA and all the bad people this is coming from,” the commissioner continued, “they are running the federal government right now.”
A fight over how to use land
Pollock’s diatribe alarmed county resident David Hensel, who called out the commissioner in a letter to the editor in the Salt Lake Tribune, saying Pollock’s incendiary rhetoric could lead to violence.
“In today’s world, labeling a group or individual a terrorist justifies killing that person …,” Hensel wrote. “Language is dangerous; using labels that justify violence against people is dangerous. If someone gets hurt or killed, well, I’m sure the governor and Reyes will send thoughts and prayers. That’s probably more than we will get from Pollock.”
SUWA officials also took umbrage at the commissioner’s language.
“Extremist language like this has torn our country apart and serves no purpose but to make it impossible to resolve issues,” said SUWA Executive Director Scott Groene. “Other Utah politicians should disavow Mr. Pollock’s speech, with the acknowledgment we need to disagree better.”
Especially disappointing to environmentalists is neither Reyes nor Johnson did anything to push back on Pollock’s inflammatory language, which they said is out of harmony with Utah Gov. Spencer Cox’s Disagree Better initiative.
For his part, Pollock characterizes himself as a straight shooter who doesn’t mince words. He said he is merely speaking the truth, not threatening violence against anyone. Conversely, he added, environmentalist groups have a history of being eco-terrorists who spike trees to hurt loggers and sawmill operators, burn down cabins, shoot livestock and block cattle from water sources.
He said environmentalist groups also routinely oppose water improvements like troughs, catchments and other measures that improve habitat for cattle and wildlife.
“They hate cattle so much that they will oppose anything that improves the cattle industry,” Pollock said, calling water-improvement projects “no-brainers” that benefit everyone.
“In the grazing community, we are being litigated constantly,” Pollock lamented at the meeting. “I mean, when we get up in the morning, SUWA files a lawsuit …. just because we got out of bed.”
Erik Molvar, executive director of the Idaho-based nonprofit Western Watersheds Project, acknowledges litigation is a tool in environmentalists’ toolbox.
“Western Watershed does file suit when federal agencies break the law and we do stand behind healthy public lands and try to reform practices by mostly commercial interest groups who are trying to destroy or degrade public lands,” Molvar said. “That’s not universally appreciated by people who want to destroy public lands.
“There are certainly some powerful and entrenched interests from the livestock industry, the oil industry and the mining industry who would like to have complete deregulation on federal public lands so they could exploit the natural resources to the maximum extent possible, regardless of the consequences for the land and the wildlife,” he added. “Most of the public finds that unacceptable, and we stand for the public interest in that regard.”
At any rate, environmentalists note, Garfield County is no stranger to litigation. In 2022, for example, Garfield County joined the state in a lawsuit that attempted to block President Joe Biden’s restoration of the Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears national monuments, both of which former President Trump slashed in size in 2017. In August, federal Judge David Nuffer dismissed the lawsuit. SUWA, the Western Water Project and Grand Canyon Trust signed on as intervenors in support of the Biden administration in the lawsuit.
Allies and fans
While Pollock certainly has some foes, he is not without fans. Attorney General Reyes stands squarely in his corner.
“There are people who talk a lot and there are people who get stuff done; that’s Leland,” Reyes remarked at the meeting. “There are show horses and then their workhorses; that’s Leland.”
Pollock, in turn, calls Reyes “a warrior.” Fortunately, the commissioner said, Garfield enjoys aggressive support from the governor and the state, which should enable the county to whip the opposition in court.
“You got to have the right people fighting to win the fight …,” Pollock told attendees at the Tropic meeting. “You can’t go into a bar and whip 20 people alone, you have to have help.”
Pollock also enjoys the support of many locals, including sixth-generation Escalante rancher Sam Spencer, who said he attended a BLM meeting about the proposed resource management plan and took offense at the stacks of paper at the event.
“It looked to me like about one-third of that was the climate change B.S. that they’re gonna try to use against us …,” he remarked at the Tropic meeting. “If they take our permits, they take our cows. You know, every rancher in … southern Utah knows Cliven Bundy. By god, there’s [sic] people that will put cows out on the desert whether the government likes it or not. And it may come to that.”
Cliven Bundy is the southeastern Nevada cattle rancher who, along with his supporters, had an armed standoff with federal authorities over grazing fees in 2014, when BLM officers attempted to seize his cattle. He spent nearly two years in jail before a federal judge threw out the case in 2018.
The BLM draft management plan has four alternatives, the least restrictive of which would leave most of the Trump-era rules in place, and the most restrictive essentially closing more roads and limiting more cattle grazing, recreational uses and target shooting, Alternative C, the preferred alternative, would divide the Grand Staircase up into four management areas.
The front country area would allow for visitor centers, interpretive sites, highway overlooks and developed trails, trailheads and campgrounds. The focus in the passage area would offer visitors more limited and less developed day-use and overnight opportunities.
In the outback area, such facilities would be rare and infrastructure and motorized access in the most restrictive primitive area would be nearly nonexistent. In addition, target shooting would be banned from the front country and primitive areas and prohibited in other areas within a quarter-mile of residences, campgrounds and developed recreation facilities.
Off-highway vehicle use would also be curtailed, limited to designated routes and banned from the primitive area.
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