Some 200 Native American tribes have united against the 3.2 billion euro project, while proponents claim the construction is the safest way to transport oil. A prairie there is covered with teepees, tents and RVs.
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On September 13, 2016, activists around the country will take up arms in solidarity with Indigenous communities fighting for their lives on the front lines.
In total, 38 people have been arrested in connection with the protest, which saw members of Native American tribes demonstrate against an oil pipeline stretching from North Dakota to IL, amid fears it could impact water supplies on their nearby reservation land. They’re also concerned that if the pipeline ruptures it could pollute local drinking water.
“It’s about damn time”, she said.
The Standing Rock Sioux have called the government intervention in the Dakota pipeline construction “stunning”. It’s about our rights to worship.
“We won the day”, said environmental activist John Wauthen from Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
Troy Eid, a Colorado lawyer who specialized in Indian law, says the action was unprecedented and a “significant setback” for the pipeline’s builders.
On Friday, the Obama administration temporarily halted construction on federal land of the planned pipeline that has angered the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, and asked the company behind the project to suspend nearby work. The Corps requested that the pipeline company voluntarily pause all construction within 20 miles east or west of Lake Oahe.
Dakota Access, a subsidiary of Energy Transfer Partners LP that is building the pipeline, declined to comment on Saturday. Now the Corps will go back and determine whether it should reconsider any of the conclusions the agency made that led to approving the pipeline. But that temporary restraining order only halts construction on part of the land the tribe is seeking to protect.
Standing Rock Tribal Chairman Dave Archambault II told hundreds of protesters who braved a torrential downpour to gather at the North Dakota Capitol grounds in Bismark that a public policy win is a lot stronger than a judicial win.
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The majority owners of the DAPL are Energy Transfer Partners L.P. (NYSE: ETP) and Sunoco Logistics Partners L.P. (NYSE: SXL). A group that supports the pipeline, Midwest Alliance for Infrastructure Now was critical of the Obama administration’s move in a statement, calling it “deeply troubling” and saying it could have a chilling effect on infrastructure development in the U.S. Over the course of the summer, they left their homes at Standing Rock and ran 2,000 miles to Washington, DC – they arrived in early August – in an effort to bring attention to the movement against the pipeline. “When they poison our water, where are we going to get it from?” “In trucks and trains or in pipelines?”
