The accident resulted in Bundy having a broken arm, a cracked skull, and a severely ripped motor nerve that left part of his face immobile.
[4] Bundy spoke at a 2014 protest against the Bureau of Land Management's decision to bar all-terrain vehicles from Recapture Canyon, an environmentally sensitive area of southeastern Utah.
Tensions between the Bundys with their militia followers and the BLM ran high until the federal officers pulled out to prevent unnecessary bloodshed.
[4][7] In 2015, Bundy and his brother heard about the story of Dwight and Steven Hammond, two Oregon ranchers who had been previously convicted of arson on federal land and jailed for that crime.
[7][8] In October 2016, jurors voted to acquit Ryan Bundy, his brother Ammon, and five others of charges ranging from conspiracy to possession of firearms in federal facilities and depredation of government property.
The jury was undecided on only one charge facing Ryan Bundy: theft of government property over allegations that he removed surveillance cameras at the refuge.
The judge declared a mistrial and ordered all charges dropped against the Bundy trio, citing "flagrant prosecutorial misconduct" by government prosecutors.
Ryan Bundy was then released from jail after being held there for nearly two years after the government argued that he was too dangerous to await trial in the community.
[7] He ran his campaign based on a strict interpretation of the Constitution, support for state sovereignty, and vehement opposition to public lands.
Bundy, like his father, believes that the federal government has no authority to own and manage the public land in the West, harkening back to the beliefs of the Sagebrush Rebellion in the late twentieth century.
He believes that chemtrails are being sprayed from aircraft onto the general population for unknown but nefarious reasons and that former president Barack Obama is not a US citizen.