Media share from the Bozeman Daily Chronicle on March 7th, 2026
Leah Veress, Chronicle Staff Writer
‘Slippery slope’: American Prairie, tribes await decision on bison grazing permits
A proposed federal decision to cancel American Prairie’s bison grazing permits is drawing sharp reactions from ranching groups, conservationists and tribal leaders, as the Bureau of Land Management reviews whether the animals qualify as livestock under the Taylor Grazing Act.
As the BLM’s 45-day final decision deadline approaches, supporters and opponents of a Jan. 16 decision to revoke American Prairie’s bison grazing leases are weighing its potential impact.
If upheld, the BLM decision will cancel American Prairie’s four existing bison grazing permits and replace them with cattle-only permissions, undoing more than 20 years of precedent.
“We’ve played by the rules for two decades and now all of a sudden they’re saying, ‘We changed our mind. We have a new set of rules’,” said Beth Saboe, director of public affairs for Bozeman-based American Prairie. “There’s no new evidence, no new science. It just seems completely arbitrary and unfairly aimed at American Prairie.”
The BLM decision marks the culmination of a 3 1/2-year legal dispute primarily between American Prairie and the Montana livestock industry, backed by Gov. Greg Gianforte and the Montana Stockgrowers Association.
“I don’t have a doubt about the decision BLM made. I think they’re following the letter of the law and interpreting it appropriately,” said Monty Lesh, second vice president of the Montana Stockgrowers.
The association appealed the American Prairie bison permits in August 2022, less than a month after they were authorized by BLM.
“We’ve never said people can’t graze bison on their private ground. We’re big private property rights advocates,” Lesh said. “The Taylor Grazing Act doesn’t list bison as ‘preferred species’. The issue was BLM allowing them to graze on allotments that are not statutorily allowed.”
While the Taylor Act does not define “preferred species,” it stipulates that the land should be used for “domestic animals for food, fiber, [and] meat production.”
The TGA was passed in 1934 to improve and maintain range and land conditions on more than 80 million acres of public land. In 1946, President Harry S. Truman established the BLM to manage public lands under the Department of the Interior. BLM draws on the authority granted by the TGA to approve grazing permits on public land, and the interpretation of the act’s language is at the center of the BLM’s proposed decision.
Gianforte’s administration and state congressional representatives asked Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to intervene in the dispute in September 2025. In December, Burgum instructed BLM to reevaluate the 2022 Biden-era American Prairie bison grazing permits.
The Jan. 16 proposed decision is rooted in BLM’s interpretation of statutory authority under the Taylor Grazing Act. The 24-page decision letter establishes working definitions for the terms “domestic” and “livestock” and concludes “that American Prairie’s bison herd is managed as wildlife in a way that is not meant for production according to the meaning of the term domestic livestock.”
Over the years, Saboe said American Prairie has allowed hundreds of its bison to be harvested through a public lottery system in which individuals whose tags are drawn pay $300 to bag an animal.
“It’s a slippery slope because, based on BLM’s proposed decision, our conservation bison herd does not meet the ‘production-oriented’ requirements,” Saboe said. “Our understanding is this is the first time the federal government has ever interpreted the Taylor Grazing Act this way, and we’re asking BLM to define ‘production-oriented’ in our protest.”
Saboe said American Prairie relies on federal land to graze its bison and cattle. Of the nonprofit’s nearly 600,000 acres, 436,000 are leased public acres set aside for livestock grazing under the Taylor Grazing Act.
“It’s important to note that we only graze bison on two of our 12 units, and we graze cattle on the rest,” Saboe said. “The reason American Prairie has a herd of about 940 bison is that we own them as livestock, we graze them as livestock, and we follow all State Department of Livestock rules and regulations.”
The Coalition of Large Tribes, an advocacy group representing more than 50 tribes, has also expressed concern about the implications the BLM decision could have. The coalition submitted a 17-page protest letter to the Interior Department highlighting the ecological, economic and cultural value of bison and the negative implications canceling the American Prairie grazing permits could have.
“Many tribes are starting to bring buffalo back into their culture, and many of them are surrounded by federal lands,” said Oliver “OJ” Semans Sr., executive director of COLT. “If these rules are put in place legally, it could affect all of the Montana tribes. The way the BLM decision is written would make it impossible for tribes to secure BLM buffalo grazing permits in the future.”
Semans is an enrolled member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, or Sicangu Oyate, and lives on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota. The reservation is home to the 28,000-acre Wolak̇ota Buffalo Range, which sustains the largest tribally managed herd in the United States.
“The Taylor Grazing Act was never, ever an issue,” Semans said. “The only time it became an issue after 100 years is when BLM decided that they’re going to ban our national mammal, the buffalo, from our national lands.”
Semans said the proposed decision is “ironic” because it undermines one of the key principles of the TGA, which aims to “stop injury to the public grazing lands by preventing overgrazing and soil deterioration, to provide for their orderly use, improvement and development, to stabilize the livestock industry dependent upon the public range …”
“We have 1,500 head of buffalo. It used to be cattle, and when we put buffalo back on the land it changed the ecosystem,” Semans said. “The animals that were gone came back. We started getting foxes. The traditional plants that were gone under the cattle started coming back.”
In February 2021, the Wolak̇ota Buffalo Range welcomed 35 bison from American Prairie. While tribal grazing permissions are not directly tied to the BLM proposed decision, Chance “Bud” Colombe, who manages the Wolak̇ota Buffalo Range, said tribes will inevitably be impacted if it is upheld.
“American Prairie is not a Native-run organization, but they are part of the wheel. They have helped us and other tribes start their herds. They’re not gatekeepers — they’re really open with their knowledge and helping people get started,” Colombe said. “But if BLM sweeps the legs out from one, they’re coming down the line.”
Once BLM releases its final decision, American Prairie or any “person whose interest is adversely affected by the final decision” can appeal it.