Tag Archives: Pipeline

Water Protector & Pipeline News – Red Terry Comes Down From Her Tree, Louisiana Court Declares Bayou Bridge Pipeline Permit Illegal & More

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Louisiana State Court Declares Bayou Bridge Pipeline Permit Illegal A Louisiana judge recently ruled that the state regulators violated guidelines when it issued Energy Transfer Partners’ controversial Bayou Bridge pipeline a coastal use permit. The permit was issued for the last 18-mile stretch of the fracked oil pipeline that would have run through the riverside town of St. James Parish, where dozens of refineries and industrial facilities are already fueling a public health crisis in the mostly African-American community. The proposed 162-mile Bayou Bridge pipeline would connect the contentious Dakota Access Pipeline to the Gulf of Mexico. As noted by … Continue reading →

Water Protector & Pipeline News – Supplies Cut Off To Mountain Valley Protestors; Judge Allows Case Against TigerSwan To Continue & More

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Judge Won’t Dismiss Complaint Against Pipeline Security Firm A state judge is refusing to throw out a complaint that a North Carolina-based private security firm operated illegally in North Dakota during protests against the Dakota Access oil pipeline. Judge John Grinsteiner also is declining for now to restrict evidence during TigerSwan’s upcoming civil trial or to dismiss company founder and President James Reese as a defendant. He ruled there are enough questions about the company’s actions and that Reese “is legally accountable for conduct performed by TigerSwan.” North Dakota’s Private Investigative and Security Board sued TigerSwan and Reese last June, … Continue reading →

3/28 News Roundup – Pipeline Protestors ‘Not Guilty’ After Claiming ‘Legal Necessity”; Support For Medicare-For-All Surges & More

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Anti-pipeline campaigners found not guilty by judge because ‘protest against climate change crisis’ was legal ‘necessity’

More than a dozen protesters who clambered into holes dug for a high pressure gas pipeline said they had been found not responsible by a judge after hearing them argue their actions to try and stop climate change were a legal “necessity”.

Karenna Gore, the daughter of former Vice President Al Gore, was among more than 198 people who were arrested because of their 2015 actions protesting the pipeline in West Roxbury, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston. Thirteen people were to go on trial this week, though prosecutors downgraded their original criminal charges to one of civil infraction.

On Tuesday, Judge Mary Ann Driscoll of West Roxbury District Court, found all 13 defendants not responsible, the equivalent of not guilty in a criminal case. She did so after each of the defendants addressed the judge and explained why they were driven to try and halt the pipeline’s construction.

Speaking outside the court afterwards, Ms Gore, 44, Director of the Centre for Earth Ethics at Union Theological Seminary in New York, said the court’s decision was historic. “What happened today was really important,” she said.

“The people….were found not responsible by reason of necessity. The irony is that we are making ourselves responsible. We’re part of the the movement that is standing up and saying we won’t let this go by on our watch. We won’t act like nothing’s wrong.”

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The environmentalist and academic Bill McKibben, who was to appear as a defence witness for the defendants, said on Twitter: “Good golly! A few minutes ago a Boston judge acquitted 13 pipeline protesters on the grounds that the climate crisis made it necessary for them to commit civil disobedience. This may be a first in America.”

More news/video/tweets/etc. in the comments.

3/14 News Roundup – Pipeline Protestors Decry State Surveillance, Texas Dems Worry Bigger Rifts Ahead With National Party & More

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Via DemocracyNow!: Critics of Bayou Bridge Pipeline in Louisiana Decry State & Company Surveillance of Protesters In Louisiana, newly disclosed documents reveal a state intelligence agency regularly spied on activists opposing construction of the Bayou Bridge pipeline, which would carry nearly a half-million barrels of oil per day across Louisiana’s wetlands. The documents show the Louisiana Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness regularly drafted intelligence memos on anti-pipeline activists, including a gathering of indigenous-led water protectors who’ve set up a protest encampment along the pipeline’s route. Other newly revealed documents show close coordination between Louisiana regulators and the … Continue reading →

3/12 News Roundup – Sanders Fires Up Phoenix, Thousands March To Stop The Kinder Morgan Pipeline & More

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Bernie Sanders in Phoenix: Senator encourages supporters to fight for change, riles opponents

Bernie Sanders returned to Arizona on Sunday, highlighting the delayed successes his 2016 presidential run secured for the Democratic Party and urging voters in the predominantly red state to keep fighting for change.

The 76-year-old independent senator from Vermont rallied supporters — and riled opponents — alongside Democratic Arizona Congressmen Ruben Gallego and Raúl Grijalva at the Orpheum Theatre in Phoenix.

The self-described democratic socialist has maintained a following among liberal Democrats in the nearly two years since he dropped out of the presidential race. He drew a young and diverse crowd Sunday, filling the 1,200-capacity theater.

“People said my ideas were too radical, but now look all over the country,” Sanders said, pointing to the uptick in states proposing higher minimum wages and decriminalizing marijuana. He also mentioned the $1 trillion infrastructure plan unveiled by Democrats last week.

Once someone stands up and fights for an unpopular idea, he said, “more and more people start thinking about it, and then it makes sense.”

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Sanders also weighed in on immigration, pledging to find a solution that would provide legal status to the roughly 700,000 immigrants with Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) status. The future of the program, which offered deportation protections for migrants whose parents brought them to the U.S. illegally as children, remains uncertain.

“I want to say to (DACA recipients) here in Arizona: If you think you’re alone, you’re not alone,” he said. “Poll after poll shows 80 percent or more want to provide legal status to DACA and a path to citizenship.”

More news/video/tweets/etc. in the comments.

11/28 News Roundup – Sanders Hits The Trail To Fight The GOP Tax Bill, Keystone XL Operators Push For Preferred Path & More

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Bernie Sanders hits the trail again, this time to fight GOP tax bill

Sen. Bernie Sanders is traveling to Kentucky, Ohio and Pennsylvania this weekend to rally against the Republican tax bill, his office told NBC News, keeping up a brisk pace of political activity since leaving the presidential race last year and ahead of a potential second one in 2020.

Sanders, who held a similar series of rallies across the country this year to oppose the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, is using his “Protecting Working Families Tour” to pressure on-the-fence GOP senators before a vote on the tax bill, President Donald Trump’s top legislative priority.

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In addition to condemning the bill for reducing taxes on the wealthy, Sanders is hoping to use the tour to argue the tax plan would pave the way for cuts to Social Security and Medicare, which have proved politically deadly for Republicans in the past.

The bill is expected to raise the deficit by $1.4 trillion, which the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office recently say could trigger an obscure budget rule that Democrats warn could force Medicare cuts.

“This legislation goes well beyond taxes,” Sanders wrote in an email that will be sent to supporters Monday. “Mark my words. If passed, the Republicans will then rediscover the ‘deficit crisis,’ and push aggressively for massive cuts in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, education — higher education in particular — nutrition, affordable housing and more.”

“That is why I am going on the road this week to talk directly to working people,” Sanders added.

More news/video/tweets/etc. in the comments, including:

*Bernie Sanders, Ben Jealous to hold Medicare-for-all rally in Baltimore
*New Study Shows How Taxing Rich Saves Lives, While Trump’s Tax Plan… Kills
*Meet the Socialist Marine & Anti-Police Brutality Protester Who Won Democratic Seats in November
*Protesters Slam Trump Attempt to ‘Vaporize’ CFPB as Agency Power Struggle Begins
*Pipeline updates, Water Protector news & more

(If the comments do not load, try clicking either the comment box itself or the ‘sort by newest/oldest’ and they should then pop up. Apologies for the inconvenience, still waiting on a patch to fix the issue!)

11/21 News Roundup – A Dysfunctional ‘PIG’ Is Leading To Environmental Disasters, Single Payer As ‘A Line In The Sand’ Issue & More

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Will You ‘Promise to Protect’? Coalition Urges New Wave of Resistance to Stop KXL

Shortly following the Nebraska Public Service Commission’s “shortsighted and dangerous” vote to green-light TransCanada’s Keystone XL (KXL) pipeline, a coalition comprised of Indigenous peoples, farmers, and ranchers living along the oil project’s proposed route published a letter on Monday urging the public to join them in protecting sacred land from corporate exploitation.

Endorsed by Native tribes, green groups, and high-profile environmentalists, the “Promise to Protect” call to action argues that making “a concerted stand” against TransCanada’s $8 billion dirty energy project “will make other fossil fuel companies think that much harder about their own expansion plans.”

“Together we’ve stopped them for many years, and we are going to keep stopping them,” the letter reads. “But we need everyone’s help. We need you to take a stand no matter what land you live or work on. The struggle to save Mother Earth begins with you.”

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The letter goes on to make several requests of those who wish to participate in the “creative resistance” against KXL that is expected to take shape in the coming months, including:

*Commitment to entirely peaceful acts of protest, even in the face of “the pain caused by TransCanada’s aggression”;
*Respect for “the leadership of Indigenous peoples, farmers, and ranchers in the action, and the plans and strategies of the front lines and their allies who have made promises to protect the land, water, and climate”;
*Preparation in advance of the demonstrations, including training sessions with organizers, so that “you’re able to find the place you’re most needed on any given day.”

The fossil fuel industry “believes that with the inauguration of Mr. Trump, the obstacles in their path had disappeared,” the letter concludes. “They are unaware of the rising tide of indigenous unity and the strong alliances with ranchers, farmers and the climate justice movement which grew stronger at Standing Rock. When the president approved the federal permits for KXL last winter, he asked TransCanada executives when construction would start: Our job is to make sure the answer is, no time soon.”

Meanwhile, ‘The Rational National’ covers a potential cause of the uptick in pipeline spills (spoiler: it involves corporate greed & corruption):

More News/video/tweets/etc. in the comments, including:

*Bernie Sanders Is Now Backing Randy Bryce—Which Could Be Very Bad News for Paul Ryan
*Whitefish energy company halts work to restore Puerto Rico’s power over unpaid bill
*De Blasio heads to Iowa in hopes of defining a national role
*The Trump Administration Revokes Legal Status for More Than 50,000 Haitian Immigrants
*Pipeline News, Water Protector Updates & More

11/20 News Roundup – Sanders Discusses The GOP Tax Plan, Nebraska Regulators Rule on Keystone XL Pipeline & More

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Bernie on CNN Sunday:

More news/video/tweets/etc. in the in the comments, including:

*Opioid Addiction: Sanders, AG talk with students in emotional high school assembly
*Meet Billings’ Democratic Socialist city council member
*New PACs are emerging on the left and the right to get women elected in 2018
*A civil rights ’emergency’: justice, clean water and air in the age of Trump
*If you tax the rich, they won’t leave: US data contradicts millionaires’ threats
*Pipeline news, Water Protector updates & more

11/9 News Roundup – Bernie Breaks Down America’s Rigged Tax System, Three Americans Now Own More Wealth Than Bottom Half of US Combined & More

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Hello friends. Starting todays news roundup with a tweet:

& a video:

and then the rest of the days news will go in the comments, including:

*Sanders: Election ‘a referendum on the disastrous Trump administration’
Election Wins Give Climate/Anti Pipeline Action a Boost
*Maine’s governor won’t expand Medicaid despite approval of ballot measure
*Pacific Islanders Demand End of Fossil Fuels to Create ‘Better, More Just World’
*AT&T, Time Warner under pressure to dump CNN
*Pipeline Updates, Water Protector News & More