Speaker 1: It is six am, June twenty nine. I have not
Speaker 1: slept yet since the cops slept it around midnight last night. UM.
Speaker 1: It's been a nice camp fire listening to birds. And
Speaker 1: just now at six am, UH, we had the first
Speaker 1: first share struck arrived for the day. Um. It's the
Speaker 1: same kind of detective guy that was over yesterday. UM
Speaker 1: and kind of in lead of things. Everyone in the
Speaker 1: UH Stop Lane three camps brought in a wake up soon. Well,
Speaker 1: we'll see what today has in store. Fifteen cars were
Speaker 1: told the first day of the cop blockade, and the
Speaker 1: tow trucks messed up the road so much that the
Speaker 1: county had to send in a huge machine to regrade
Speaker 1: the dirt road. Cops still weren't letting cars through, but
Speaker 1: for day two people didn't put up a physical, cold
Speaker 1: resistance to the sheriff's driveway blockade. There were other things
Speaker 1: to figure out and strategize. It is early afternoon on
Speaker 1: June nine. I'm still at the Stop Line three camp
Speaker 1: in Minnesota. The all the all the protesters and water
Speaker 1: defenders who got arrested yesterday just got back to the camp,
Speaker 1: so they were released after one night in jail. UM
Speaker 1: and they were they had there was a there was
Speaker 1: a pretty pretty cheery greeting for them here at the
Speaker 1: here at the Line three camp. Um. A few a
Speaker 1: few of the people were a little little more somber
Speaker 1: because of course their friends were in jail. But everyone
Speaker 1: most people were pretty excited to see each other again. UM,
Speaker 1: and most people seemed pretty optimistic. UM. So that's kind
Speaker 1: of steady. Think that's kind of the state of things
Speaker 1: right now. Uh to two Sheriff's trucks are still preventing
Speaker 1: cars from going onto the driveway um at the stop
Speaker 1: Line three camp, but so far there's been no passive
Speaker 1: or active resistance to that today unlike yesterday. UM, So
Speaker 1: we'll see if that changes in the next few hours.
Speaker 1: I'm probably gonna head back to their first camp to
Speaker 1: pick up some supplies and I'll decide what I do
Speaker 1: from there. But I mean, the the atmosphere the Stop
Speaker 1: Playing three camp is super unique. Um. It's a few
Speaker 1: hundred probably people here now, pretty massive space. Uh. They
Speaker 1: actually you know, own this property where they're basing the
Speaker 1: camp out of them. They can move onto the like
Speaker 1: for actions. They can move onto the like Line three site,
Speaker 1: which is just like just across the way. Um, but
Speaker 1: the fact that it's their property does give them some
Speaker 1: distinct advantages in terms of how the law can crack
Speaker 1: down on them without you know, having horrible objects on
Speaker 1: the state's part. Um. But yeah, they have a really
Speaker 1: they have a really good set up. They got farmed.
Speaker 1: You know, they're growing food. They have really nice like kitchen.
Speaker 1: You know, they like buildings and stuff. Um. Decent at
Speaker 1: mant of tents. Um water is a little bit low,
Speaker 1: but people are trying to figure that out, so we're
Speaker 1: trying trying to go easy on the water at least
Speaker 1: at the moment. It took longer than I thought, but
Speaker 1: eventually I made my way back to the Earth First camp.
Speaker 1: Just got back to earth First Camp. It is a
Speaker 1: little bit past midnight, so technically it's now June. But
Speaker 1: still still not slept since uh the night of, So
Speaker 1: I'm excited to finally be back in my tent. People.
Speaker 1: When when I arrived, people were having a small fire
Speaker 1: and singing songs, so that was nice. Um, fox the
Speaker 1: spider in my tent, I'll have to deal with that later. Um.
Speaker 1: But anyway, there's still a decent amount of Earth First
Speaker 1: people staying at the at the Line three camp. Um,
Speaker 1: I assume some more we'll head over tomorrow. It's not
Speaker 1: fully made up my mind what I'm gonna do yet,
Speaker 1: but on lean lean towards probably staying at this camp,
Speaker 1: trying to talk to some more people, and then the
Speaker 1: last day I'll join wherever other people are doing. If
Speaker 1: they're doing action, I'll I will be there in whatever
Speaker 1: reporting capacity makes the most sense. UM. So yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean everyone, there's there's more, more and more people are
Speaker 1: coming back to Earth First camp right now. Um, tomorrow
Speaker 1: might actually have some you know, it may be more
Speaker 1: more of a full day. I'll try to swim in
Speaker 1: the lake because it'd be a shame if I did
Speaker 1: not do that for this trip. Um. But yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean it's it's been an interesting almost forty eight hours
Speaker 1: without sleep. Um and uh in dealing with all of
Speaker 1: these issues surrounding how the sheriffs are trying to crack
Speaker 1: down on the on the Line three protesters. Um oh,
Speaker 1: I guess the one thing is like the Sheriff's actually
Speaker 1: left and like the late afternoon um on the on
Speaker 1: on the on the twenty nine, So we don't really
Speaker 1: know what their plan is. UM. I heard some people
Speaker 1: from like the Line three side, like I have initiated
Speaker 1: some like um legal proceedings to help get like like
Speaker 1: more clear legal access to the driveway to their own property. UM.
Speaker 1: So that could be the reason why we left, But
Speaker 1: we don't totally know why they like left so early,
Speaker 1: like they did not they didn't stay super late to
Speaker 1: di continue blocking off access to the driveway. So that
Speaker 1: part is still up in the air. I'm sure. I'm
Speaker 1: sure I'll find out more tomorrow and find out we did.
Speaker 1: It's the night of June Wednesday. UM, let's have to
Speaker 1: get up at like five thirty tomorrow. UM. There is
Speaker 1: uh people are planning in action for tomorrow. UM. I
Speaker 1: don't have any details for what's going on in order
Speaker 1: to my understanding as many other people, because just today
Speaker 1: we found out that like the reason why the cops
Speaker 1: were blocking the driveway to the Line three protest camp
Speaker 1: is because during that time, en Bridge, the company it's
Speaker 1: a pipeline, completed drilling on one of the two spots
Speaker 1: planned under the Mississippi River and they wanted to make
Speaker 1: sure there wasn't any people there to prevent that. So
Speaker 1: that's why the cops are blocking off access. To the
Speaker 1: road UM from the protest camp. UM So because now
Speaker 1: that that drilling spot is complete, I think that kind
Speaker 1: of through wrenching people's protest plans for for tomorrow. UM.
Speaker 1: So things are kind of up in the air. All
Speaker 1: all I know is that I have to be up
Speaker 1: early and we will be driving somewhere. UM. I think
Speaker 1: people are probably gonna be locking down, like with like
Speaker 1: lock boxes and probably soft blockades. UM So expecting you know,
Speaker 1: arrests to happen. UM. Yeah, but the mood, the mood
Speaker 1: is pretty tense right now. Everyone's pretty anxious. UM. We're
Speaker 1: just kind of doing doing doing doing a weight in
Speaker 1: game at the moment. UM, I'm gonna try my form
Speaker 1: my best to not get arrested, but that's not really
Speaker 1: up to me, UM, because I mean, I just don't
Speaker 1: know what the location is going to be. Like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, there's just so little information, and I have
Speaker 1: no idea what the what the cops reaction is going
Speaker 1: to be to any of any of this. UM. The
Speaker 1: sheer number of people committed to doing the land offense
Speaker 1: and water defense and UM committed to like you know,
Speaker 1: showing up in person to UM advocate for the treaties
Speaker 1: to be actually followed. I mean, of course there this treaties,
Speaker 1: most of them were you know, there's there's there's reasons
Speaker 1: to talk about how how people were coerced into signing
Speaker 1: certain treaties. But in fact is the ones that we
Speaker 1: have right the ones that people have right now, aren't
Speaker 1: even being voled um in terms of you know, stuff
Speaker 1: for this Line three pipeline and crossing over indigenous land
Speaker 1: um and sacred areas. So so yeah, there's just so
Speaker 1: many people dedicated to doing this that I'm not sure
Speaker 1: if the cops will be prepared for how many people
Speaker 1: it looks like are going to be caravanning down um
Speaker 1: and depending what their plans are, causing a scene. Um.
Speaker 1: But I'm I'm about to go to bed. I have
Speaker 1: to I have to sleep, have a have a long
Speaker 1: day ahead of me, um, long day of trying to
Speaker 1: not get arrested and then missing my right back to
Speaker 1: my home UM on the other side of the country.
Speaker 1: Before I recap what happened on the July first stop
Speaker 1: Line three direct action, I want to give some background
Speaker 1: for the whole Line three thing. Now, you probably heard
Speaker 1: of the stop Plan three movement this year. A few
Speaker 1: public actions have grabbed national attention, like the protest side
Speaker 1: Chase Bank, and perhaps a few actions near the pipeline,
Speaker 1: but you might be surprised to hear that the fight
Speaker 1: has been going on for over seven years. Back en Bridge,
Speaker 1: a Canadian oil giant, started the process of applying to
Speaker 1: replace their existing Line three pipeline with a new, bigger pipeline,
Speaker 1: large portions of which are along a completely new route,
Speaker 1: including areas that would violate the treaty rights of the
Speaker 1: indigenous Oshawanabe by passing through tribal territory, fresh water sources, ecosystems,
Speaker 1: and public lands, while endangering primary areas of hunting, fishing,
Speaker 1: wild rice, and cultural resources in the eighteen fifty five
Speaker 1: treaty territory. For most of the past seven years, the
Speaker 1: plans for the pipeline going through Minnesota have been caught
Speaker 1: up in litigation and regulatory hearings. There have been on
Speaker 1: the ground direct actions and protests, but all in hopes
Speaker 1: of preventing the construction from starting. That changed November of
Speaker 1: twenty when the Minnesota Pollution and Control Agency issued water
Speaker 1: crossing permits in mid November, and then the Army Corps
Speaker 1: of Engineers issued the other necessary permits mere days later.
Speaker 1: Embridge had been positioning pipes and equipment for years doing
Speaker 1: so called pre construction, so as soon as they got
Speaker 1: the go ahead they could rush to dig, drill and
Speaker 1: start placing pipes in the ground. The first pipe was
Speaker 1: laid out to wait all the way back in November,
Speaker 1: three years before Mbridge got the permission to actually begin construction.
Speaker 1: The current Line three, which carries crude oil from Edmonton,
Speaker 1: Alberta to Superior, Wisconsin, was originally built in the sixties.
Speaker 1: Pipe corrosion caused numerous spills from the seventies to the
Speaker 1: early two thousands. To circumvent this, Mbridge reduced the operating
Speaker 1: pressure and instituted yearly high resolution inspections using modern technology
Speaker 1: to track ongoing corrosion. As a result of the existing
Speaker 1: Line three pipe ships four hundred and thirty thousand barrels
Speaker 1: per day. When finished, the new Line three would ship
Speaker 1: nine hundred and fifteen thousand barrels of Tar San's crude
Speaker 1: oil a day, one of the dirtiest fuels on Earth,
Speaker 1: and that's more than double the current Line three pipeline.
Speaker 1: The new Line three will carry enough oil to produce
Speaker 1: about one hundred and seventy billion kilograms of carbon dioxide
Speaker 1: per year. That's equivalent to about fifty coal power plants
Speaker 1: or thirty eight million vehicles on our roads. Total project
Speaker 1: costs have risen to nine point three billion, with the
Speaker 1: Minnesota segment of the pipeline costing four billion. A big
Speaker 1: part of the argument four Line three in Minnesota is
Speaker 1: supposed job creation. The problem is that the majority of
Speaker 1: these jobs are short term, part time higher workers from
Speaker 1: out of state. M Bridges fourth quarter Jobs reports that
Speaker 1: only thirty three percent of the almost five thousand workers
Speaker 1: in the project were from Minnesota, and they worked only
Speaker 1: twenty percent of the total hours. M Bridge has a
Speaker 1: job promise that the Line three replacement project would create
Speaker 1: about eight thousand and six hundred jobs, the majority of
Speaker 1: which are local in Minnesota over a two year period,
Speaker 1: including forty hundred union construction jobs, half of which are
Speaker 1: expected to be filled locally. However, instead of seventy of
Speaker 1: jobs being local, the opposite is true, with nearly scent
Speaker 1: of hours being worked by out of state workers. In
Speaker 1: Minnesota alone, the new Line three pipe would cross more
Speaker 1: than two hundred water ecosystems and tunnel under twenty rivers,
Speaker 1: including the Mississippi River twice, the source of drinking water
Speaker 1: for millions of people. The new Line three would threaten
Speaker 1: many pristine lakes, rivers, and streams, including where wild rice grows,
Speaker 1: a foundation of the Oshanabes people's traditional way of life
Speaker 1: and spiritual practices. Since the announcement that construction could begin
Speaker 1: last November, and Bridge has been literally working non stop
Speaker 1: to finish this pipeline as soon as possible. Resistance against
Speaker 1: Line three has also been wrapped baly increasing the past year,
Speaker 1: all leading up to this past summer, with many calls
Speaker 1: going out for national support. People are continuing to try
Speaker 1: to stop construction through litigation or pressuring public officials, while
Speaker 1: others are taking direct action in hopes of slowing down
Speaker 1: the construction itself. As protests have continued, the state response
Speaker 1: has grown more harsh. The most recent Line three protesters
Speaker 1: who have gotten arrested for locking down on equipment are
Speaker 1: being charged with felony theft for quote temporarily taking control
Speaker 1: of the construction equipment unquote by locking themselves to it.
Speaker 1: These new harsh protest related charges like felony, resisting and
Speaker 1: obstructing are usually first tested on bipop folks, and then anarchists,
Speaker 1: and then eventually everyone. If you thought sheriffs shutting down
Speaker 1: vehicle access to the main stop Line three camp right
Speaker 1: as Mbridge was completing drilling under the Mississippi River a
Speaker 1: little sus well, wait until you hear that Embridge is
Speaker 1: also directly giving cops millions of dollars. This is from
Speaker 1: Vice News quote. A Canadian oil company has given Minnesota
Speaker 1: law enforcement two million dollars to fund the policing and
Speaker 1: protests against the construction of its new pipeline ambridges that
Speaker 1: have fund called the Public Safety Escrow Trust in May
Speaker 1: as a part of its permitting process for the Line
Speaker 1: three pipeline route. The funds in this account have been
Speaker 1: used to reimburse costs associated with maintaining the piece around
Speaker 1: the pipeline, including for officer wages, lodging, and boom trucks,
Speaker 1: according to the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission and Line three permits.
Speaker 1: Since its creation, three d twenty seven thousand dollars of
Speaker 1: the Mbridge fund has gone to the Cass County Sheriff's Office,
Speaker 1: located one eighty miles north of Minneapolis, for security patrols
Speaker 1: of their private property. This amounted to around seven percent
Speaker 1: of the department's salary and overtime budget for the year.
Speaker 1: Between November and February nineteen one, over forty employees dedicated
Speaker 1: more than seven thousand hours to safety patrols. Another one
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy one dollars went to the Belatrimi County's
Speaker 1: Sheriff's Department for officer training going back as earliest seventeen
Speaker 1: in preparation for the responses to the Line three protests.
Speaker 1: All of this was paid for by Enbridge. In its
Speaker 1: permitting documentation, the Public Utilities Commission cited increased law enforcement
Speaker 1: expenses around pipelines in other parts of the country as
Speaker 1: reasoning for establishing the fund. The funds lived in an
Speaker 1: astro count managed by a state appointed official, to whom
Speaker 1: agencies send requests for reimbursement from en Bridge of costs
Speaker 1: related to quote coordination of public safety and emergency responders,
Speaker 1: public safety related costs for maintaining the peace in and
Speaker 1: around the construction site, review, an oversight of any private
Speaker 1: security services, and other similar costs unquote. The account is
Speaker 1: technically not meant to be used for equipment unless it's
Speaker 1: quote personal protective equipment and extremely broad term that is
Speaker 1: defined nowhere. New Ryan gear, for instance, has been paid
Speaker 1: for by the escrow account. State appointed account manager has
Speaker 1: rejected law enforcement requests for reimbursement for cutting tools for
Speaker 1: lock boxes and such, but there are ways around that.
Speaker 1: In Hubbard County, for example, Mbridge just donated cutting tools
Speaker 1: separate from the escorow account entirely. Upon waking up at
Speaker 1: five thirty am July one, I trudged myself to the
Speaker 1: coffee station in the little forest kitchen, packed up my
Speaker 1: recording equipment and batteries, wrote down a few lawyers phone
Speaker 1: numbers on my stomach in case the day go south,
Speaker 1: and hopped in the media car with other folks from
Speaker 1: the Earth First Journal and began the second caravan of
Speaker 1: my trip in Minnesota. It is July one, about nine am.
Speaker 1: Care A many people just arrived at a pipeline construction
Speaker 1: site UM, the Line three pipeline construction site in northern Minnesota.
Speaker 1: I am on the ground here reporting with about I
Speaker 1: don't know, a couple of dozen, a couple of dozen protesters,
Speaker 1: water defenders, line defenders. It's spent a lot of coordination
Speaker 1: between the activists to get here. UM and finding like
Speaker 1: specific sites that are still active and drilling. Since n
Speaker 1: Bridge just finished one of their drilling projects under the
Speaker 1: Mississippi like three days ago. So currently people are walking
Speaker 1: to the site that they are gonna be stationed at.
Speaker 1: I'm a little bit behind. Yeah, I will be reporting
Speaker 1: here as long as I as long as I can
Speaker 1: be um. If I need to get out, then I
Speaker 1: can evacuate, but goals to be here as long as
Speaker 1: I can. Pretty pretty big caravan, A lot of a
Speaker 1: lot of people here, going right up to the drilling site.
Speaker 1: By the time I got to the construction site, there
Speaker 1: were already about a dozen people locked down onto the
Speaker 1: construction equipment. Got more people attached to the pipeline for
Speaker 1: SHARE's vehicle at the site, got another SHARE's vehicle at
Speaker 1: the site, got another about like three or four three
Speaker 1: or four law enforcement vehicles have arrived. These abot of
Speaker 1: people messed up, locked up, Camo block, black block, got
Speaker 1: a few people attached the actual pipeline, fists raised up.
Speaker 1: Overall the mood here's actually a lot less tent than
Speaker 1: it was on the way. Most people are actually hooked up.
Speaker 1: Now everyone's kind of falling falling into their place kind
Speaker 1: of knows what they want to do, what impact they
Speaker 1: want to have. WHOA, wow, everyone's pretty uh, a lot
Speaker 1: of a lot of like opening cam lotterie gotten pipeline
Speaker 1: workers kind of leaving. Um, looks like they're all gonna
Speaker 1: clear to the site and then I'm guessing more cops
Speaker 1: are gonna roll in arrest and arrest of many people
Speaker 1: as they can. That is what I'm looking at right now. Um,
Speaker 1: there are currently people hooked up to the Line three
Speaker 1: pipeline that has just been a drilling under the Mississippi River.
Speaker 1: People hooked up to the equipment. UM, on both sides
Speaker 1: of the road here, there's people on that side and
Speaker 1: there's people here on this side. We have law enforcement
Speaker 1: on the scene now. Um, we have lots of people
Speaker 1: holding up banners, people hooked up onto the equipment. We have. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a it's on. It's less tense than the the
Speaker 1: then the build up to the actual action. UM, we
Speaker 1: have people's you know, anyone's have the road willing signs,
Speaker 1: We've got it. We've got a lot a lot of
Speaker 1: banners and I don't know about like I'm guessing fifteen
Speaker 1: to twenty people locked down with lock boxes onto the
Speaker 1: drilling equipment, onto the taking equipment, and onto the pipeline itself.
Speaker 1: People channing stop line three. Fact the police. There were
Speaker 1: a lot of a lot of line workers here when
Speaker 1: UH people arrived, and they've all since left. Um, no
Speaker 1: one seems super eager to chat. Uh. There is Hubbard
Speaker 1: County Sheriff's here. I believe the I believe the main sheriff,
Speaker 1: his name is Corey, is here. It's like Corey sheriff
Speaker 1: man is talking to the people standing on the side
Speaker 1: of the road. UM. I'm not sure what used to saying.
Speaker 1: People on that side are not I'm not breaking any
Speaker 1: loss there. They are just standing on public property holding
Speaker 1: up signs that is not not a crime. There is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm guessing around twenty people have gone to various types
Speaker 1: of equipment and pipelines. UM. People here in black blocks,
Speaker 1: people here in cameo block. UM, and so people just
Speaker 1: hearing like write regular clothes. UM. I've talked to a
Speaker 1: few of these people in the last few hours. Why
Speaker 1: they're doing this, why they think it's important. Um, it's
Speaker 1: about topping line three, about protecting the wild rice farms
Speaker 1: in this area, but protecting the Great Lakes um, defending
Speaker 1: people's access to water and honoring the treaties that were signed.
Speaker 1: You know until years ago that the construction of the
Speaker 1: pipelines breaks. Those are those are the things people are
Speaker 1: talking about right now. UM. I believe the police are
Speaker 1: gonna wait for all of the pipeline people to leave,
Speaker 1: um before they start coming in and trying to like
Speaker 1: to detach people and get folks arrested. Um. Yeah, more
Speaker 1: shares off, more shares, vehicle showing up, It's gonna I think,
Speaker 1: I think things are going to happen. Um, this will
Speaker 1: be a long day. There was a brief instant where
Speaker 1: a pipeline worker got into an argument with the protester
Speaker 1: and the worker assaulted the protester. And then when the
Speaker 1: last pipeline workers tried to leave in a pickup truck,
Speaker 1: they almost ran over like a dozen people. As that
Speaker 1: was happening, protesters tried to stop the vehicle to prevent
Speaker 1: it from hitting more people. The truck got away and
Speaker 1: people survived with limited injuries. I then made my way
Speaker 1: over to the other side of the road where a
Speaker 1: collection of moms and other protesters were in the ditch
Speaker 1: holding up Stop Line three signs Sheriff Corey A. Yukes
Speaker 1: was also there, and I had the pleasure of finally
Speaker 1: getting to see him after I've heard so much talk
Speaker 1: about him. As I arrived, he was arguing with protesters
Speaker 1: about the pipeline and inevitable climate change caused water shortages. Drinker,
Speaker 1: your family have cancer? You know what they make about.
Speaker 1: Sheriff Corey of Hubberd County just said when the water
Speaker 1: dries up, their kids can drink pop as in like soda,
Speaker 1: soda pop. So I guess that is his plan for
Speaker 1: when there's water shortages, Everyone's just gonna drink soda, according
Speaker 1: to the elected sheriff of Hubberd County. Evidently Sheriff corne
Speaker 1: Yukes was piste after that conversation, because a minute later
Speaker 1: he sent over officers to arrest the two people he
Speaker 1: was talking with. Wow, I don't know, Dylan, what's everything?
Speaker 1: You're under arrest? You're under the two folks that Sheriff's
Speaker 1: tried to arrest ran into the forest evading capture. After that,
Speaker 1: Corey turned his attention to me. All right, s Garrison
Speaker 1: David's Pigheart Radio. You can't be within the right away
Speaker 1: like this. I wish I stand I would try to
Speaker 1: find some private property, all right, that they give you
Speaker 1: permission to be on, then you're good like that kind
Speaker 1: out the side of the public though, right, no, it's
Speaker 1: within the right away. You can't do it, You've been
Speaker 1: told according to Minnesota pedestrian law, standing on the side
Speaker 1: of intersection on public property is completely acceptable, but as
Speaker 1: has been shown before, it's impossible to argue with cops
Speaker 1: in the street. So at this point I needed evac
Speaker 1: due to Sheriff Corey threatening me specifically with arrest. Just
Speaker 1: got back to Earth First Camp um from Park Rapids.
Speaker 1: See the last time I chat, which is like a
Speaker 1: second hour hour, I should go our half an hour
Speaker 1: and a half ago. I was like, I think at
Speaker 1: least over over seven arrests at that time, probably close
Speaker 1: to run ten now. But there was like fourteen people
Speaker 1: still locked to uh the digging equipment at the at
Speaker 1: the line three site. So the sheriffs and I think
Speaker 1: now state police have been called in are having one
Speaker 1: heck of a time on doing this lock boxes. So
Speaker 1: all of work at that section of the site was
Speaker 1: totally shut down for like basically basically the entire day.
Speaker 1: Um So in terms of successfulness of the action. There
Speaker 1: was less people arrested than what was gonna be initially predicted. Um,
Speaker 1: it looks like mostly arrested are people who just fully
Speaker 1: locked down. Other people were either able to get away
Speaker 1: hiding the forest, or I think some people set up
Speaker 1: like a designated like site that that the cops didn't
Speaker 1: funk with eventually. Um, but yeah, so let's let's let's
Speaker 1: arrest anticipated um work stop page went on for a
Speaker 1: really long time. UMS, A lot of press attention there,
Speaker 1: um coverage and yeah, and people have you know, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of people locked down. Getting to Minneapolis tomorrow,
Speaker 1: then I'll be back into Portland. So this is basically
Speaker 1: the end the end of this trip. In all, fourteen
Speaker 1: people locked down to various construction equipment, including vehicles and
Speaker 1: the pipeline itself. Twenty eight people were arrested at the
Speaker 1: July first action. Everyone arrested was released a day later.
Speaker 1: Bales were set high at ten thou dollars without conditions
Speaker 1: and five thousand with conditions. No cash bail at temper
Speaker 1: cent was offered, and many of the activists were charged
Speaker 1: with felony theft again for quote temporarily taking control of
Speaker 1: the equipment they locked themselves to. Since the July first action,
Speaker 1: there's been about one action per week that has stopped
Speaker 1: work on the pipeline, including lockdowns, tree sets, and human
Speaker 1: body suspensions over equipment and roads using massive bipods or tripods.
Speaker 1: Most actions have been done around the horizontal drill used
Speaker 1: to drill under the waterways. It's a very specialized machine
Speaker 1: that serves as a choke point for a clear line
Speaker 1: of attack. Especially since this fight is mostly about water,
Speaker 1: this makes it a sensible target. Also, since July first,
Speaker 1: we've been seeing more felony charges against lockdown protesters. It's
Speaker 1: kind of become the norm the past two months for
Speaker 1: this type of protest felony theft, stacked with misdemeanors and
Speaker 1: gross misdemeanors. Currently, they are about sixty people facing felony
Speaker 1: charges just in the past two months. Since June eight,
Speaker 1: the line three sites had at least twenty eight spills
Speaker 1: of fracking fluid were called frackouts. One of them happened
Speaker 1: at the head of the Mississippi after the camp up
Speaker 1: there was cleared out by the cops. After this, in
Speaker 1: mid July, some of the Mbridge water permits were temporarily
Speaker 1: revoked while the state was in a drought, but that
Speaker 1: did not really impact construction in some better news, Remember
Speaker 1: when the Hubbard County sheriffs were blocking off the driveway
Speaker 1: to the Noma Wad Camp and we all thought that
Speaker 1: was probably illegal. Well after I left, Sheriff's stopped physically
Speaker 1: blocking the driveway, but did always have a deputy station
Speaker 1: nearby to watch insight everyone who goes on the driveway.
Speaker 1: As of July twenty, Minnesota ninth District Judge Jenna Asted
Speaker 1: granted a temporary restraining order prohibiting the Hubbard County Sheriff's
Speaker 1: office from blocking vehicular access to the Noma Wad Camp.
Speaker 1: In the order, Judge Asted ordered the Sheriff's office to
Speaker 1: stop quote barricading, obstructing, and otherwise interfering with access to
Speaker 1: the property unquote, and prohibited deputies from stopping vehicles, issuing citations,
Speaker 1: or arresting or threatening to arrest individuals for driving on
Speaker 1: the driveway. Again, quoting investigative journalist Karen Savage quote. Assistant
Speaker 1: Hubbard County Attorney Anna Emerling argued that the actions by
Speaker 1: the sheriff's office were part of a large effort to
Speaker 1: monitor Line three opposition. The judge, however, was not persuaded,
Speaker 1: ruling the driveway blockade and subsequent issuing of citations by
Speaker 1: the Sheriff's office substantially violated the plaintiff's right to use
Speaker 1: and enjoy the property. Quote this action is about an easement,
Speaker 1: and there's no showing the laws being broken on the
Speaker 1: disputed easement unquote, Ostad wrote in the order. It was
Speaker 1: announced in June that TransCanada, another Alberta based whale company,
Speaker 1: canceled the Keystone XL pipeline after Biden removed permits when
Speaker 1: he first took office. High visibility and performative protests have
Speaker 1: trying to get Biden and other officials to do this
Speaker 1: same for the Line three, but at this point success
Speaker 1: seems unlikely. According to Enbridge, Line three is over eight
Speaker 1: complete and may be finished as soon as September one.
Speaker 1: There's this concept called the meat grinder. You jump into
Speaker 1: the grinder in hopes of either clogging the gears or
Speaker 1: hoping that somebody with power to stop the grinder sees
Speaker 1: you inside and will take action, But more often than not,
Speaker 1: nothing will happen, and you'll just get ground up and
Speaker 1: spit out stuff like the protest lockdowns can kind of
Speaker 1: feel like that, especially when you're getting as and I
Speaker 1: in charges like felony theft and there's over sixty people
Speaker 1: with felony charges. On the other hand, just standing outside
Speaker 1: the grinder holding anti meat grinders signs feels like it's
Speaker 1: not nearly doing enough, and trying to covertly destroy the
Speaker 1: grinder from the outside can be scary and potentially get
Speaker 1: you into a lot of trouble. This is an issue
Speaker 1: with activism in a broad sense. We saw a little
Speaker 1: bit of this in Portland last year, with people showing
Speaker 1: up at police stations the night after night, not really
Speaker 1: knowing what to do, and then just getting attacked by
Speaker 1: cops and getting tons of charges. One point members of
Speaker 1: the Canoe Collective, the Indigenous Women and two Spirit led
Speaker 1: group run out of now Mawag kept bringing up is
Speaker 1: that no matter the result of line three, the fight
Speaker 1: doesn't just end with this pipeline. There will be other pipelines,
Speaker 1: other deforestation projects, and more industrialization that threatens indigenous territory.
Speaker 1: All the mistakes and successes firebombs and lockdowns, marches and
Speaker 1: rallies can be learned from to make whatever the next
Speaker 1: mobilization effort is stronger, and time and time again. One
Speaker 1: of the most useful, if not the most useful things,
Speaker 1: is just to have more people willing to do the thing.
Speaker 1: Minor and infrequent, isolated acts, whether they be ecological sabotage,
Speaker 1: monkey wrenching, or lock tents and marches, have been shown
Speaker 1: to be inadequate against the international oil giants when happening
Speaker 1: only every once in a while. Markers can be ignored,
Speaker 1: damaged pipelines can be repaired, but if the system gets
Speaker 1: overwhelmed all at the same time, then that might be
Speaker 1: a different story. Congruent mass mobilization has to shock the
Speaker 1: cogs in the machine enough to make instituting major change
Speaker 1: the only possible outcome. That may seem far fetched or fanciful,
Speaker 1: but if you look at his story and even modern
Speaker 1: history in places outside the States, you can see echoes
Speaker 1: inspects of this very thing. And if you look to
Speaker 1: indigenous women and to spirit both in history and now
Speaker 1: on the modern day, you can learn some really insightful
Speaker 1: ways to resist the fascist behemoth and capitalist slash colonial leviathan.
Speaker 1: Because they've been forced to resist these systems and structures
Speaker 1: for a very long time. Listen to them, hear what
Speaker 1: they have to say, and that wraps up my episodes
Speaker 1: based on my trip to Minnesota, staying at the Earth
Speaker 1: First and Stop Line three camp, I love to cover
Speaker 1: and signal boost more stuff in this vein in the
Speaker 1: near future. One other aspect about getting involved with movements
Speaker 1: like this is that you could experience a little mini anarchy.
Speaker 1: Whether in the Earth First camp or the Maywogue, you
Speaker 1: get to see how the world could be outside of capitalism,
Speaker 1: cops in the state, and once you get to live
Speaker 1: like that, you start to wonder why do we have
Speaker 1: any other way. It's almost intoxicating to be able to
Speaker 1: experience the world as it could be. If you want
Speaker 1: to donate directly to the New Collective, you can go
Speaker 1: to bit dot l y slash stop Pipeline three. When
Speaker 1: donated to the legal Fund, you can go to Protest
Speaker 1: Law dot org slash line three, and the bail fund
Speaker 1: is at Stop Line three Bail Funds dot org. You
Speaker 1: can learn more about the Stop Line three movement from
Speaker 1: the New Collective on social media that's g I n
Speaker 1: I W Collective, or check out Stop Line three dot org.