Huddling for Thanksgiving in freezing cold weather near the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in North Dakota, about 300 protesters from over 200 Native American tribes continued their opposition to Energy Transfer Partners’ Dakota Access Pipeline. Seeking to complete a pipeline from North Dakota’s tar sands oil industry to Illinois, the Native American activists hope President Barack Obama and the Army Core of Engineers will kill the project, seeking to run pipe under the Missouri River. Speaking on Thanksgiving, the sad symbol of the plight of Native Americans could not be overlooked from pipeline project. “Given what we are currently fighting against, Thanksgiving is not really a celebration for us,” said activist Dallas Goldtooth in Cannonball, near the pipeline site. Standing Rock Sioux contends that the pipeline threatens the tribe’s water supply.
Dakota Access Pipeline seeks to complete 1,172 miles of pipe from North Dakota to Illinois, where existing pipeline brings crude oil to the Gulf of Mexico for eventual refining. Standing Rock Sioux leaders insist that the pipeline’s route traverses sacred Indian lands, but, more importantly, threatens precious water resources. Army Core of Engineers is currently reviewing claims of environmental hazards to Native American lands. Energy Transfer Partners contends that there’s no adverse risk to any water supply, despite past problems with oil pipelines leaking into local water supplies. “Concerns about pipeline’s impact on the local water supply are unfounded,” insisted ETP, parent company of Dakota Access Pipeline. “Multiple archeological studies conducted with state historic preservation offices found no sacred items along the route,” insisted ETP officials.
Native American’s line in the sand with the Dakota Access Pipelines speaks volumes about the U.S. treatment of Native Americans since the earliest days of U.S. colonization, through Indian Wars to President Andrew Jackson’s May 28, 1830 Removal Act, forcing Native American Tribes to relocate to desolate parts of the Midwest and Southwest. Whatever the real environment impact, the Dakota Access Pipeline raises 500 years of Native American mistreatment, prompting over 200 tribes to protest loudly. U.S. government officials don’t want to re-litigate the horrific treatment of Native Americans since colonial times to present day. One trip through Washington D.C. new Native American Museum glosses over the U.S. government’s long history of brutality toward Native Americans. Delta Access Pipeline has raised all the unfinished business.
Energy Transfer Partner CEO Kelcy Lee Warren doesn’t get the real problem of building out his pipeline on what’s left of Native American lands. “Concerns about the pipeline’s impact on the local water supply are unfounded,” said Warren, antagonizing Native Americans fighting for their rights. Instead of rethinking the pipeline route or doing something for the Standing Rock Sioux reservation, Warren gives the same flimsy excuses for building the pipeline. “It’s a dedication to our ancestors,” said Goldtooth, expressing the Native American opposition to the pipeline. “It’s in dedication to their efforts, their struggle, that we continue to fight on,” expressing deeply held sentiments by the Native American community. For too long, other minority groups have stole the headlines from Native Americans, the long forgotten and victimized indigenous Americans..
Instead of relying on the Army Core of Engineers, Obama should convene a summit of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and members of Congress to once and for all deal with the forgotten plight of Native Americans. When CEOs like Warren want to build on Native American lands, they need to cut tribes in on some of the expected profits, understanding that the U.S. government does the bare minimum for Native Americans. Meeting with Standing Rock Sioux tribal leader Dave Archambault II would have been the best way to discus a pipeline project on tribal lands. Given the abysmal treatment of Native Americans by the U.S. government, corporations would get far more cooperation from tribes by figuring out a way to reimburse resource-starved Native American reservations. Goldtooth expresses precisely the long history of Native American abuse, mistreatment and exploitation.
Serving up Thanksgiving dinners at Cannonball by Hollywood activists like Jane Fonda doesn’t address the long history of Native American neglect. Gathering over 200 tribes to draw a line in the sand against the Dakota Access Pipeline, the Native American community wants to draw attention to forgotten indigenous Americans. “What our ancestors went through 200 years ago, in a way we are kind of going through the same struggle. What is happening in North Dakota is just a mere continuation of 500 years of colonization,” said Goldtooth, putting the pipeline question into perspective: Native Americans are standing up for their rights. Whatever the Army Core of Engineers finds to best protect Native American resources, it doesn’t address years of neglect and mistreatment by the U.S. government. Energy Transfer Partners would win more friends making the pipeline worthwhile for the Sioux tribe.
