{"id":9417,"date":"2019-10-30T09:25:09","date_gmt":"2019-10-30T14:25:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/unitedresourceconnection.org\/cannon-ball-nd-58528\/native-rights-advocates-quash-pipeline-riot-boosting-act\/"},"modified":"2019-10-30T09:25:11","modified_gmt":"2019-10-30T14:25:11","slug":"native-rights-advocates-quash-pipeline-riot-boosting-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitedresourceconnection.org\/cannon-ball-nd-58528\/native-rights-advocates-quash-pipeline-riot-boosting-act\/","title":{"rendered":"Native rights advocates quash pipeline Riot Boosting Act"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Crowd outside Federal Judge Lawrence L. Piersol\u2019s courtroom in Rapid City rallied peacefully in June at his hearing to determine if South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem\u2019s 2019 legislation violates the First Amendment guarantees of oil pipeline resisters. (Photo COURTESY \/ Andy Johnson)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

RAPID CITY \u2013 Native and other grassroots pipeline fighters celebrated a court settlement Oct. 24, barring enforcement of the clauses in Gov. Kristi Noem\u2019s 2019 Riot Boosting Act that violate constitutionally protected freedom of speech, assembly and movement.
\nNoem pushed through the eleventh-hour law in the most recent legislative session expressly to ward off out-of-state support for pipeline resistance. She said her motive was to save the state money as she moved to defend the proposed TransCanada Corp. Keystone XL Pipeline construction from widespread tribal and other local opposition.
\n\u201cSouth Dakota knew these laws couldn\u2019t stand up to our legal challenge so rather than face embarrassment they decided to capitulate,\u201d said Dallas Goldtooth, organizer for the plaintiff Indigenous Environmental Network.
\n\u201cWe will celebrate this win but remain vigilant against further government attempts to outlaw our right to peacefully assemble,\u201d said Goldtooth, a Lakota Din\u00e9 and individual plaintiff, who testified that he is peacefully resisting the construction.
\n\u201cWe will fight on for the protection of the Oceti Sakowin people and the sacredness of Mother Earth with no hesitations,\u201d he said in a written statement.
\nAnother individual plaintiff who is fighting peacefully, Nick Tilsen, also spoke for his plaintiff organization NDN Collective when he said, \u201cThe Boosting Act was an insult to the Constitution and an attempt to muzzle the voices of the people and our movement to defend Mother Earth.\u201d
\nThe settlement upholds the temporary injunction against the Riot Boosting Act that Western South Dakota U.S. District Judge Lawrence L. Piersol granted Sept. 18 to keep the law from remaining in force as its constitutionality was in doubt.
\nThe settlement stipulates that it will hold until the unconstitutional clauses \u201care substantially revised by legislative action.\u201d It also stipulates that the state must pay plaintiffs\u2019 attorney fees.
\nTribes and organizations have stalled the project with other federal lawsuits, based on alleged violations of environmental, constitutional and treaty protections. \u201cOnward, we will continue to fight for air, land, water and our rights,\u201d Tilsen said in the statement.
\nPlaintiffs in the other cases are the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, Ft. Belknap Indian Community, Indigenous Environmental Network, North Coast Rivers Alliance, Northern Plains Resource Council, Bold Alliance, Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth, Natural Resources Defense Council, and Sierra Club.
\nEmbroiled in the court proceedings, pipeline promoter TC Energy Corp., formerly TransCanada Corp., said it will not undertake construction on the final stretch of the Canada-to-Texas tar-sands crude-oil infrastructure through the unceded 1868 Ft. Laramie Treaty territory of Nebraska, South Dakota and Montana, before spring of 2020.
\nJohn Harter, board chair of the statewide non-profit Dakota Rural Action, lead plaintiff in the case against the Riot Boosting Act, professed, \u201cWe are proud to have stood alongside our native allies to fight for the rights of all South Dakotans.
\n\u201cGov. Noem and Attorney Gen. (Jason) Ravnsborg settled this case because they are clearly in the wrong \u2013 something they and the Legislature were warned of as they rushed to pass this unconstitutional law,\u201d Harter said.
\n\u201cIn fact, the whole process of pushing pipelines through this state \u2013 from the use of eminent domain to benefit a foreign corporation, to cracking down on citizens protecting the land and water \u2013 violates our Constitution and leaves taxpayers, once again, to foot the bill,\u201d Harter said.
\nHe thanked the ACLU for litigating \u201cthis crucial case\u201d on behalf of plaintiffs. Stephen Pevar, senior staff attorney with the ACLU\u2019s Racial Justice Program called the state\u2019s anti-protest efforts \u201cplainly unconstitutional.
\n\u201cThis settlement helps ensure that no one has to fear the government coming after them for exercising their First Amendment right to protest,\u201d he said, adding that it \u201cshould also serve as a lesson for other legislatures considering similar anti-protest efforts.\u201d
\nACLU\u2019s contract lawyer Brendan Johnson, partner with the Robins Kaplan law firm, said that \u201cby equating peaceful organization and support of protest with \u2018riot boosting\u2019 and incitement to riot, the government stifled our clients\u2019 abilities to speak out against the Keystone XL Pipeline.
\n\u201cWe\u2019re happy that the state recognized that these vague and overbroad laws threatened the First Amendment rights of South Dakotans on every side of the issue and that, as a result of this settlement, no one\u2019s voices will be silenced.\u201d
\nNoem released a written response indicating that in the wake of the court\u2019s approval of the settlement agreement, her administration \u201ccan begin work to update crimes that have been on the books since South Dakota became a state.
\n\u201cWe remain focused on preserving law and order while protecting the right to free speech and peaceful assembly,\u201d she said, adding, \u201cIt\u2019s important to note that it is still illegal to riot in South Dakota. No one has the right to incite violence.\u201d
\nIn the plaintiffs\u2019 effort to avoid violence, the settlement stipulates that her administration must send out a letter to law enforcement across the state, telling officers to refrain from enforcing the Riot Boosting Act.
\nTC Energy needs approval of many more permits in order to achieve its goal of transporting tar-sands from the mine fields of ancestral Athabascan homelands in Canada to the refineries and export shipping facilities on Texas\u2019 Gulf of Mexico.
\nThe corporate literature says that diluting the tar with lighter petroleum products to make a liquid called dilbit, which allows it to flow in a pipeline, is the safest way to move the heavy crude down south and abroad.
\nHowever, its Keystone I Pipeline from Canada to the Texas Gulf spilled dilbit more than a dozen times in 2011, the first year of operations. The product is considered a hazardous material.
\nThe U.S. State Department under Secretary John Kerry and former President Barack Obama, denied the Presidential Permit for the KXL to cross into U.S. territory on the grounds that it was not in \u201cthe national interest.\u201d
\nSubsequently President Donald Trump, a former shareholder in TransCanada Corp., fulfilled a campaign promise by ordering the State Department\u2019s reversal of the permit decision and then cancelling that permit to order a different permit of his own.
\nThe corporation triumphed over environmental, water and property rights advocates opposing construction of the southern part of the line from the Texas Gulf Coast to Steele City, Nebraska. Pre-construction activities are underway on the remainder of the route through Nebraska, South Dakota and Montana.
\nHowever, further development is in jeopardy, as stakeholders await the outcome of a State Department hearing Oct. 29 in Billings, Montana on the project\u2019s Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement.
\nIn addition, opponents were scheduled to submit comments Oct. 29-31 to the South Dakota Water Management Board in Pierre regarding the company\u2019s applications for free use of public surface and underground water for construction man-camps and pipeline startup testing.<\/p>\n

(Contact Talli Nauman at talli.nauman@gmail.com<\/a>)<\/p>\n

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Crowd outside Federal Judge Lawrence L. Piersol\u2019s courtroom in Rapid City rallied peacefully in June at his hearing to determine if South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem\u2019s 2019 legislation violates the First Amendment guarantees of oil pipeline resisters. (Photo COURTESY \/ Andy Johnson) RAPID CITY \u2013 Native and other grassroots pipeline <\/p>\n

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Shared by Native Sun News Today<\/a> October 30, 2019<\/p>\n

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