02/06/2026
Ammon Bundy, once the most recognizable face of the right-wing militia movement, is increasingly isolated from his former allies due to his outspoken criticism of the Trump regime’s thuggery. Bundy became prominent through two armed standoffs with federal agents, which made him a leading figure in the Patriot Movement, embraced by anti-government extremists, 2nd Amendment maximalists, and even some mainstream conservatives.
In November, Bundy published an essay calling the regime’s treatment of undocumented immigrants a “moral failure.” He wrote, “To call such people criminals for lacking official permission … is to forget the moral law of God, the historical truth of our own founding, and the Constitutional ideals that continue to define justice.” After the killing of Renee Good in Minnesota, Bundy said ICE’s conduct “clearly looks like tyranny.” In a conversation with the author, Bundy expressed shock at the violence and said, “When it comes to the more humanitarian side of it, I think the left has it much more correct than the nationalist right.”
His past included leading a 2014 standoff with the Bureau of Land Management in Nevada with his father, Cliven Bundy, and a six-week 2016 occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon that ended with a rancher’s death. He later faced a protracted legal fight in Idaho over a defamation judgment.
While Bundy’s earlier activism once drew attention from outlets like Fox News and sympathy from elements of the Republican Party, his critique of immigration policy now alienates many within the militia world. Some former allies refuse to condemn ICE’s actions or even praise agents involved in violent incidents, and a few dismiss Bundy’s principled defense of equal rights for immigrants as contradictory to their current priorities. Bundy himself acknowledges feeling “a little bit alone” as he finds his former community diverging from the principles that once united them.