The Standing Rock Sioux, whose tribal lands are a half-mile south of the proposed route, say the pipeline would desecrate sacred burial and prayer sites, and could leak oil into the Missouri and Cannon Ball rivers, on which the tribe relies for water. The administration’s decision came within hours of that decision.
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But then the devastation turned to jubilation thanks to a surprise statement from federal officials announcing they would not authorize construction of the Dakota Access pipeline on Army Corps of Engineers land bordering and under Lake Oahe until they reassess previous decisions.
A joint statement from the departments of Justice, Army and the Interior said: “This case has highlighted the need for a serious discussion on whether there should be nationwide reform with respect to considering tribes’ views on these types of infrastructure projects”.
“Everywhere in Indian Country, people are talking about this”, said Eid, who spoke by phone Saturday while on horseback during a parade at the Navajo Nation Fair in Window Rock, Arizona.
Energy Transfer Partners did not respond to NPR’s request for an interview.
“Our government stood up for the people”, she said in a statement.
The protest occurring on native land for the Dakota Access Pipeline has been long and brutal, but it is clear that their voices have finally been heard, and on Friday, the Obama administration ordered a halt on construction until further environmental studies can be done.
“This could bog down or delay every single infrastructure project moving forward”, he said.
“(The protest) was initially just the pipeline, but the way the government has made a decision to label these protest, and us, makes me feel like my life, my families lives don’t matter”, she said.
“We won the day”, said environmental activist John Wauthen from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. “Things are very different now, whether from the right wing or left wing, politics of all kinds are being injected into this”.
But moments after the ruling, the U.S. government urged construction to stop temporarily at one particular site. More likely is a compromise, at least over the issues raised by the Standing Rock Sioux, that would reroute the pipeline.
McKibben and his group 350.org were some of the most vocal opponents of Keystone XL, and helped bring about the pipeline’s ultimate defeat in 2015 when the White House refused to issue the permit the project needed to ship oil from Canada to refineries in Gulf Coast states. “We shouldn’t need a GAO report, but we clearly do”, Grijalva said Thursday prior to the judges decision and the three department announcement.
Protests across the country brought in a small victory for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and their many supporters when the USA government promised to temporarily halt all construction on government owned land.
The Dakota Access Pipeline is expected to move 470,000 barrels of oil a day from the Bakken region to refineries in states to the southwest, ending in IL.
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After months of protests by the Standing Rock Sioux and other Native Americans, a federal judge denied the tribe’s request to stop construction of the four-state, $3.8 billion Dakota Access pipeline.
