Emergency officials: We won’t let pipeline protesters freeze

Peaceful demonstrations against an oil pipeline in North Dakota caused major traffic trouble in Fort Lauderdale, Friday night.

Just hours after my interview with the artists on Friday, November 25, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s Chairman, Dave Archambault II, announced that the US Army Corp of Engineers would be closing public access to the camp. The veterans hope their presence will help maintain peace as a Monday deadline for evacuation of the Oceti Sakowin campsite approaches. “Never scream or swear or at them”, said the instructor, a military veteran. The ACLU North Dakota and Amnesty International have also called for a formal investigation.

“We’re at a point in history where this country can make a choice”, Hoskin said. Native Americans throughout USA history have been pushed off their land and killed by government orders.

“I’m scared. I’m a California girl, you know?” said Loretta Reddog of Placerville, California, a protester who said she arrived several months ago with her two dogs and has yet to adjust to the harsher climate.

Wesley Clark Jr., an organizer of Veterans Stand With Standing Rock, Kandi Mossett of the Indigenous Environmental Network, and Brenda White Bull who served 20 years in the Marine Corps and is also a direct descendant of Chief Sitting Bull, delivered a message to representatives of the National Guard, the Veterans Association, Tigerswan Private Security, who is hired by DAPL, and North Dakota law enforcement.

A woman from the Tlingit Tsimphean tribe holds an eagle feather into the air as “water protectors” demonstrate on December 3.

Everyone danced, greeted each other and helped fundraise money to send to the Oceti Sakowin camp.

But another map of the reservation after the 1851 Treaty of Ft. Demonstrators say they’re prepared to stay until changes are made to the route of the four-state, $3.8-billlion pipeline.

Veterans, who signed up on the Veterans Stand for Standing Rock group’s Facebook page, are joining protesters who are determined to protect the sacred land from the Dakota Access pipeline project.

The 1,172-mile (1,885-kilometer) pipeline project, owned by Texas-based Energy Transfer Partners LP, is mostly complete, except for a segment planned to run under Lake Oahe, a reservoir formed by a dam on the Missouri River.

“We are asking those in power to listen to the voice of the people”, Lopez said. “So if they start evacuating en masse looking for shelter – which I highly suspect will happen – we would take care of that”. That GoFundMe campaign has raised over $900,000 in support. “It’s a hard choice that will upset a lot of investors and oil companies, but we can make a better, or humane choice”. “This week is the anniversary of the Sand Creek Massacre”. Opponents, including the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, say it will harm drinking water and cultural sites. Laramie between the US government and nine Indian tribes shows the pipeline cuts clearly through the middle of this boundary.

At the northern end, beneath a line of hills where police vehicles and spot lights mark the proposed path of the pipeline, there are daily courses in “non-violent direct action”, led by experienced protesters from other parts of the United States.

Two weeks ago the USA government put a halt to the pipeline construction project, saying more analysis and debate are needed. The court has yet to rule on the matter.