Missoula, Montana never suffers a dearth of pickup trucks, but the number of jacked-up 4x4s rises dramatically in late April. That’s when Backcountry Hunters & Anglers gathers for its annual three-day Rendezvous, with camo-clad history lessons, camp cook-offs featuring meals like Arizona javelina, and lectures on the finer points of field-dressing an ungulate. At a standing-room-only seminar titled “Use the Whole Animal,” topics range from elk tongue preparation (parboil it) to whether brain really tastes like sausage. (It does.)
The crowd here is a mix of biologists, military vets, TV hunting personalities, former hippies, and ardent Trump supporters. All are dedicated to one issue: the preservation of America’s wild public lands. Many are wearing sweatshirts emblazoned with the phrase public land owner, a rallying cry for the nonprofit group. During an awards luncheon, a muscled guy from Wyoming says he’s skeptical of climate change but nonetheless opposes the state’s Republican congresswoman, Liz Cheney, on account of her support for transferring federal lands to the states. At an outdoor wild-game feast, I run into a blue-eyed 33-year-old woman named Lauren, who says she got into hunting because “I thought it was important to take responsibility for meat-eating, karmically.” Now she’s hooked on killing. Her entry in the cook-off is a cougar pinwheel roast stuffed with morels.
Across the tent, a reddish-blond man in a blue shirt and camo vest yucks it up with a handful of brawny guys drinking beer. Land Tawney, BHA’s 42-year-old president, is a ruddy-faced, fifth-generation Montanan who calls creeks “cricks” and could fit a pen in the gap between his front teeth. He owns more than 20 guns. In an era when much of the GOP is intent on transferring or selling off vast swaths of public land (mostly in the West), Tawney represents an aggressive line of defense for America’s wild places. Since he took the reins in 2013, BHA has grown tenfold, largely because of Tawney’s ability to create this bipartisan coalition.
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One of his more charming habits is a tendency to compare politicians to dogs. “The dog understands the stick,” Tawney says, “and so do politicians.” Recently he has been using the stick to great effect. This spring, Tawney took on former Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz — who resigned in the summer to take a job as a political pundit at Fox News — after the representative introduced a bill to “dispose” of 3 million acres of federally managed public land. Tawney countered by mounting a fierce grassroots response: At a rally at Montana’s capitol organized by his group, a thousand protesters in cowboy hats and camo crammed the corridors, denouncing the bill.
BHA helped launch similar efforts in Idaho and New Mexico. Chaffetz eventually stood down, and shortly thereafter, in a combative press release, Tawney issued something of a warning: “[Chaffetz’s] fellow lawmakers should take note of the ire and rapid response by hunters and anglers. We aren’t going away.”
Tawney’s role at the Rendezvous includes greeting his tribe, meeting with BHA’s 24 nationwide chapter chairs, and managing his full-time staff of 14, who oversee the event. Throughout the weekend there are plenty of VIPs to glad-hand, among them Montana Gov. Steve Bullock, bigwigs from sponsors including Yeti, and hook-and-bullet celebrities like Randy Newberg, a TV host on the Sportsman Channel. But Tawney appears most focused on the next generation, listening in on a session about millennial recruitment and introducing himself to BHA’s younger members. The Rendezvous’ most popular event is story night, essentially organized fish tales, during which Newberg tells a Garrison Keillor–esque yarn about his uncle throwing a treble hook into his dad’s crotch. Then a 10-year-old girl takes the stage. Her name is Lola, and she’s from Wisconsin. Along with her parents, she screens a simple film that consists entirely of her catching fish. Every time she hooks up, the crowd roars. At the end of the film, she takes the stage and says, “My name’s Lola, and I’m a public land owner from Wisconsin!”
At that, Tawney stands up, pumps his fist, and howls thunderously. 