Thank you Ganan,

For your measured and objective response.  I really do appreciate that.

My understanding (and some limited experience in dealing with federal courts) is that often, when an Oral Hearing is had at the end of trial proceedings, the Judge and their staff attorney already have a prepared bench order and they are typically looking to fill in any "gaps" that they may be missing or plug in any holes to close out any arguments for an appeal.

If that is true, I am struggling to justify to myself why she would ask both parties to spend time focusing on preparing requested relief in the event of a remand if she has no intent of going down that path.  It seems superflous and a tremendous waste of time given the limited time they have.  From what I have seen of the filings, the judge is very straightforward and is looking to be more efficient with time, not the other way around.

I have had the opportunity to review the filing with a federal attorney, and they agreed with my interpretation (without me offering it up before they reviewed and opined on it).  That said, they were not acting as my attorney and only had a brief review and discussion of the case (20 minutes).

In our own research circle for LAC, I have noted that in a variety of instances the Judge has indicated through commentary and action that she will likely not find in favor of the Tribal arguments and also to some extent the Rancher arguments.  However, we have discussed the Rosemont issue as a group and I have voiced it as my primary concern where there may be potential merit in the procedural violations.  It sounds like the Judge may agree (per her latest filing) and that causes me concern to see those fears realized earlier than the court hearing date.

My personal interpretation (which can be wrong) is that she is likely to remand the case back to the BLM and will likely be trying to use the oral arguments platform to identify a path towards remanding without vacatur (as requested by the Defandants) but may or may not still put in place an injunction.  She is asking for the parties to prepare, so she can see what their requested remedies/relief are to see if there is middle path that can be worked out.  This may delay construction start, but not for a material time frame (in which case I would come back in).  If she is leaning towards a vacatur (and assuming I may be able to discern that from the call) than I would not, simply because I do believe the upside would be limited until TP would be remedied in the future.  

In the end, we are one month away from the hearing in which we will learn a lot from a few hours of conversation.  I sincerely hope you are right that Judge Du has not made up her mind either way and is simply asking for both sides to prepare/discuss requests for relief in the event of a remand only as a means to expedite the process as a "just in case" mesaure and not a showing of her hand of what her true intentions are.   If there is no bench order at this stage, then I would agree with what you are saying as true.  

As I said in my post, I will be listening to the hearing on January 5th and make my decision at that stage in determining where the truth lies and whether to "jump back in" with my invest or not.

I am a fan of the company and its prospects as a whole, just not a fan of the situation and liability Judge Du represents.

Regardles, again, thank you for keeping things civil and taking the time to put together a thoughtful response,

IRR