Nevada Wild Horse Meeting Disrupted by Activists

RENO, Nev. (AP) — Two employees of an international animal protection organization were escorted by police from a public meeting in northern Nevada after disrupting it to protest the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's handling of wild horses.

Edita Birnkrant and Nicole Rivard of Friends of Animals were threatened with arrest before also being kicked out of their rooms at a Minden hotel-casino, where the meeting was held Thursday evening. Over 100 people attended the meeting on the bureau's draft long-range management plan for 4.8 million acres of public land in its Carson City District.

After an agency official spoke about it, Birnkrant grabbed the microphone, displayed a yellow strip of crime scene tape and shouted that the agency and ranchers have committed "crimes against wild horses." After the microphone was unplugged, she continued yelling while carrying a banner with an anti-BLM message.