#standingrocksioux — Public Fediverse posts

1.4M gallons of fluid leaked from #DakotaAccess [#DAPL] drilling, report says

The #StandingRockSioux Tribe, which wants the #OilPipeline shut down, says spills near #LakeOahe were #environmental violations.

By Mike Soraghan
10/01/2024 06:45 AM EDT

"The tribe at the forefront of fighting the Dakota Access oil pipeline has found evidence that more than a million gallons of #DrillingFluid leaked as construction crews tunneled under the lake that is the tribe’s main source of #DrinkingWater.

"Authors of an engineering report filed last year in a North Dakota lawsuit estimates that 1.4 million gallons of drilling mud escaped the confines of the tunnel in 2017 — at the same time authorities above ground were breaking up the #protests about the pipeline.

"The report found no indication in the records of pipeline developer #EnergyTransfer that anyone checked to see if it had reached the lake, called Lake Oahe.

"The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe says that amounts to violations of the environmental rules laid out for the construction project. Among other things, those rules called on construction crews to stop drilling and investigate when there were signs of leaks.

"Tribal officials say the Army Corps of Engineers, which controls the lake, never disclosed them."

Original article:
https://www.eenews.net/articles/1-4m-gallons-of-fluid-leaked-from-dakota-access-drilling-report-says/

Archived article:
https://archive.ph/VOism

#KelcyWarren #Trump #StandWithStandingRock
#NoDAPL #CorporateColonialism
#BigOilAndGas #WaterIsLife #EnvironmentalRacism #StandingRock

I don't blame them!

#KristiNoem banned by two more #NativeAmerican tribes in #SouthDakota

Governor, plagued by dog-killing story, unwelcome in 20% of her state after she accused tribal leaders of benefiting from cartels

Dani Anguiano
Mon 13 May 2024 19.52 EDT

"The move by the #YanktonSioux tribe and the #SissetonWahpetonOyate tribe last week follows criticism from the governor who has – without evidence – accused tribal leaders of 'personally benefiting
from drug cartels. The #Oglala, Rosebud, #CheyenneRiver and #StandingRockSioux tribes banished Noem earlier this year.

"In a statement announcing the ban in April, the #RosebudSioux said the decision was based not only on Noem’s recent comments but an 'ongoing strained relationship' with the governor, who took office in 2019.

"The tribe cited Noem’s support of the #KeystoneXLPipeline, her opposition to #checkpoints on reservation borders established by the #CheyenneRiverSioux and Oglala Sioux during the pandemic, and her support of the removal of 'significant sections' of #NativeAmerican history from state social-studies standards, among other issues.

"'Governor Noem claims she wants to establish meaningful relationships with tribes to provide solutions for systemic problems. However, her actions as governor show blatantly otherwise,' the tribe said in a statement.

"'Her disingenuous nature towards Native Americans to further her federal political ambitions is an attack on tribal sovereignty that the Rosebud Sioux tribe will not tolerate.'"

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/13/kristi-noem-banned-tribes-south-dakota

#StandWithStandingRock #NoKXL #CulturalErasure #FirstNations #NativeAmericanNews

I don't blame them!

#KristiNoem banned by two more #NativeAmerican tribes in #SouthDakota

Governor, plagued by dog-killing story, unwelcome in 20% of her state after she accused tribal leaders of benefiting from cartels

Dani Anguiano
Mon 13 May 2024 19.52 EDT

"The move by the #YanktonSioux tribe and the #SissetonWahpetonOyate tribe last week follows criticism from the governor who has – without evidence – accused tribal leaders of 'personally benefiting
from drug cartels. The #Oglala, Rosebud, #CheyenneRiver and #StandingRockSioux tribes banished Noem earlier this year.

"In a statement announcing the ban in April, the #RosebudSioux said the decision was based not only on Noem’s recent comments but an 'ongoing strained relationship' with the governor, who took office in 2019.

"The tribe cited Noem’s support of the #KeystoneXLPipeline, her opposition to #checkpoints on reservation borders established by the #CheyenneRiverSioux and Oglala Sioux during the pandemic, and her support of the removal of 'significant sections' of #NativeAmerican history from state social-studies standards, among other issues.

"'Governor Noem claims she wants to establish meaningful relationships with tribes to provide solutions for systemic problems. However, her actions as governor show blatantly otherwise,' the tribe said in a statement.

"'Her disingenuous nature towards Native Americans to further her federal political ambitions is an attack on tribal sovereignty that the Rosebud Sioux tribe will not tolerate.'"

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/13/kristi-noem-banned-tribes-south-dakota

#StandWithStandingRock #NoKXL #CulturalErasure #FirstNations #NativeAmericanNews

I don't blame them!

#KristiNoem banned by two more #NativeAmerican tribes in #SouthDakota

Governor, plagued by dog-killing story, unwelcome in 20% of her state after she accused tribal leaders of benefiting from cartels

Dani Anguiano
Mon 13 May 2024 19.52 EDT

"The move by the #YanktonSioux tribe and the #SissetonWahpetonOyate tribe last week follows criticism from the governor who has – without evidence – accused tribal leaders of 'personally benefiting
from drug cartels. The #Oglala, Rosebud, #CheyenneRiver and #StandingRockSioux tribes banished Noem earlier this year.

"In a statement announcing the ban in April, the #RosebudSioux said the decision was based not only on Noem’s recent comments but an 'ongoing strained relationship' with the governor, who took office in 2019.

"The tribe cited Noem’s support of the #KeystoneXLPipeline, her opposition to #checkpoints on reservation borders established by the #CheyenneRiverSioux and Oglala Sioux during the pandemic, and her support of the removal of 'significant sections' of #NativeAmerican history from state social-studies standards, among other issues.

"'Governor Noem claims she wants to establish meaningful relationships with tribes to provide solutions for systemic problems. However, her actions as governor show blatantly otherwise,' the tribe said in a statement.

"'Her disingenuous nature towards Native Americans to further her federal political ambitions is an attack on tribal sovereignty that the Rosebud Sioux tribe will not tolerate.'"

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/13/kristi-noem-banned-tribes-south-dakota

#StandWithStandingRock #NoKXL #CulturalErasure #FirstNations #NativeAmericanNews

I don't blame them!

#KristiNoem banned by two more #NativeAmerican tribes in #SouthDakota

Governor, plagued by dog-killing story, unwelcome in 20% of her state after she accused tribal leaders of benefiting from cartels

Dani Anguiano
Mon 13 May 2024 19.52 EDT

"The move by the #YanktonSioux tribe and the #SissetonWahpetonOyate tribe last week follows criticism from the governor who has – without evidence – accused tribal leaders of 'personally benefiting
from drug cartels. The #Oglala, Rosebud, #CheyenneRiver and #StandingRockSioux tribes banished Noem earlier this year.

"In a statement announcing the ban in April, the #RosebudSioux said the decision was based not only on Noem’s recent comments but an 'ongoing strained relationship' with the governor, who took office in 2019.

"The tribe cited Noem’s support of the #KeystoneXLPipeline, her opposition to #checkpoints on reservation borders established by the #CheyenneRiverSioux and Oglala Sioux during the pandemic, and her support of the removal of 'significant sections' of #NativeAmerican history from state social-studies standards, among other issues.

"'Governor Noem claims she wants to establish meaningful relationships with tribes to provide solutions for systemic problems. However, her actions as governor show blatantly otherwise,' the tribe said in a statement.

"'Her disingenuous nature towards Native Americans to further her federal political ambitions is an attack on tribal sovereignty that the Rosebud Sioux tribe will not tolerate.'"

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/13/kristi-noem-banned-tribes-south-dakota

#StandWithStandingRock #NoKXL #CulturalErasure #FirstNations #NativeAmericanNews

I don't blame them!

#KristiNoem banned by two more #NativeAmerican tribes in #SouthDakota

Governor, plagued by dog-killing story, unwelcome in 20% of her state after she accused tribal leaders of benefiting from cartels

Dani Anguiano
Mon 13 May 2024 19.52 EDT

"The move by the #YanktonSioux tribe and the #SissetonWahpetonOyate tribe last week follows criticism from the governor who has – without evidence – accused tribal leaders of 'personally benefiting
from drug cartels. The #Oglala, Rosebud, #CheyenneRiver and #StandingRockSioux tribes banished Noem earlier this year.

"In a statement announcing the ban in April, the #RosebudSioux said the decision was based not only on Noem’s recent comments but an 'ongoing strained relationship' with the governor, who took office in 2019.

"The tribe cited Noem’s support of the #KeystoneXLPipeline, her opposition to #checkpoints on reservation borders established by the #CheyenneRiverSioux and Oglala Sioux during the pandemic, and her support of the removal of 'significant sections' of #NativeAmerican history from state social-studies standards, among other issues.

"'Governor Noem claims she wants to establish meaningful relationships with tribes to provide solutions for systemic problems. However, her actions as governor show blatantly otherwise,' the tribe said in a statement.

"'Her disingenuous nature towards Native Americans to further her federal political ambitions is an attack on tribal sovereignty that the Rosebud Sioux tribe will not tolerate.'"

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/13/kristi-noem-banned-tribes-south-dakota

#StandWithStandingRock #NoKXL #CulturalErasure #FirstNations #NativeAmericanNews

#StandingRock: FBI had up to 10 informants during the #resistance to DAPL

The FBI's special agent in charge, reveals in his lengthy deposition, his search for the motivation of Standing Rock #WaterProtectors to make their stand -- and he fails to find the most obvious -- The Protection of the Sacred

by Brenda Norrell, Censored News, March 15, 2024

"In a new court case, the State of #NorthDakota claims it didn't have enough resources during the Standing Rock resistance to Dakota Access Pipeline, and wants the U.S. to pay up. The testimony reveals that the FBI had up to 10 informants, not just FBI informant Heath Harmon, in the camps.

"'Up to 10 informants managed by the FBI were embedded in anti-pipeline resistance camps near the #StandingRockSioux Indian Reservation at the height of mass protests against the #DakotaAccessPipeline in 2016,' Alleen Brown reports today at Grist.

"'The new details about federal law enforcement surveillance of an #Indigenous #EnvironmentalMovement were released as part of a legal fight between North Dakota and the federal government over who should pay for policing the pipeline fight. Until now, the existence of only one other federal informant in the camps had been confirmed.'

"'The FBI also regularly sent agents wearing civilian clothing into the camps, one former agent told Grist in an interview. Meanwhile, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, or BIA, operated undercover narcotics officers out of the reservation’s Prairie Knights Casino, where many pipeline opponents rented rooms, according to one of the depositions."

Read more:
https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2024/03/standing-rock-fbi-had-up-to-10.html

#ACAB #NoDAPL #StandWithStandingRock #LandDefenders #WaterProtectors #NativeAmericanActivists

Footing the $15 Million Bill for the #DakotaAccessPipeline's #PrivateArmy

Sen. John Hoeven added monies to the Department of Justice’s budget for FY 2017 to reimburse #NorthDakota for incurred costs.

By Ruth Hopkins ,
IndianCountryTodayMediaNetwork

Published: May 23, 2017

“Last fall, the eyes of the world were fixated on #StandingRock.

“Among the images burned into the brains of so many abroad were those of Morton County sheriff’s department, joined by law enforcement officers from across the country, bedecked in military gear and armed to the teeth, brutalizing defenseless water protectors for expressing their first amendment rights and freedom of religion. Eyes were opened when mercs sicced vicious attack dogs on women and children guarding sacred burial grounds with their lives. Folks thousands of miles away watched in horror as they witnessed concussion grenades being thrown into crowds and elders being maced in the midst of sweat lodge raids. People will never forget live stream video picked up by mainstream media, showing hundreds of civilians being shot with water cannons in subzero temperatures by a corporate police state army. Some photos of injuries were judged too graphic to post by social media, as they revealed a young woman with a near severed limb and another who’d been blinded in one eye.

“This was not Iraq or Afghanistan. There was no foreign enemy invading our shores. These events occurred in the middle of the United States, on Lakota treaty lands; and the only thing these innocent people had done was dare to stand in the way of the Dakota Access Pipeline, the same one Bismarck, North Dakota residents rejected due to fears it would contaminate their water supply. This war zone created by Dakota Access and Morton County was meant to subdue Standing Rock residents and water protectors and force them to accept an unwarranted risk to their fresh water and the desecration of ancestral graves, under the barrel of a gun.

“Here in the states, hundreds of Native Nations and the American public sided with Standing Rock. Scores came to camp along the shores of the Mni Sosa (Missouri River). Others rallied in the local cities, signed petitions, and called the White House. Millions were outraged by the injustice.

“Yet who is paying for the corporate police state brutality I just mentioned? You are.

“Senator John Hoeven (R-ND), who accepted money from Energy Transfer Partners (the company behind the Dakota Access Pipeline) and has been vocal in his support of both the Dakota Access Pipeline as well as the Keystone XL pipeline, has announced that North Dakota will receive $15 million in federal funds to reimburse the state for costs incurred as a result of militarizing Barney Fife and company while they pushed the pipeline through for ETP and engaged in the violent, forced removal of water protectors. Hoeven slid said monies into the Department of Justice’s budget as part of Fiscal 2017 funding legislation.

“By the way, Hoeven sits on the Senate Appropriations Committee and is now the chairman of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs. Welcome to Custer’s wet dream.

“The distinguished Senator from North Dakota would have us believe his state was alone in its mission to extinguish #NoDAPL. Nothing could be further from the truth.

“When Morton County requested backup, law enforcement officials from across the nation came to North Dakota via the Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC). The Sheriff’s Association also showed up in full force.

“New York Daily News writer Shaun King obtained audio where #EnergyTransferPartners freely admitted that they worked closely with the Sheriff’s Association, and wow, did they ever. They became one and the same.

“#WaterProtectors who lived at camp can attest to #ETP and law enforcement’s collusion and fraternization, but the record speaks for itself.

“The Sheriffs’ Association has a $3.46 million budget, according to tax forms. Some of this funding comes from corporate sources, like TigerSwan. TigerSwan maintains offices in Iraq and Afghanistan. TigerSwan’s CEO is a former adviser to the multinational private security firm, Blackwater. Blackwater was founded by Erik Prince, a Trump campaign donor and the brother of Betsy DeVos, the US Secretary of Education. Besides funding the Sheriff’s Association, TigerSwan is in charge of Dakota Access intelligence and supervising overall security for the company. Tigerswan works for Dakota Access, while funding and partnering with the Sheriffs’ Association.

“The Sheriff’s Association purchased military gear from the US Department’s Defense Logistics Agency thanks to the Defense Department’s 1033 program. Think corporate welfare for the defense industry.

“Wait, there’s more. #EnergyTransferPartners CEO #KelcyWarren offered to reimburse North Dakota and Morton County for costs due to defending the Dakota Access Pipeline.

“So why are US taxpayers forking over $15 million to North Dakota?

“Despite the fossil fuel industry’s wishes, America is not an oil company with an army. We should not be bankrolling our own oppression.”

https://truthout.org/articles/footing-the-15-million-bill-for-the-dakota-access-pipeline-s-private-army/

#BigOilAndGas #CorporateColonialism
#colonialism #Genocide #StandWithStandingRock #StandingRockSioux #TigerSwan #ErikPrince #Blackwater #DAPL #ACAB #ErikPrinceColonialism

After infiltrating #StandingRock, #TigerSwan pitched its ‘#counterinsurgency’ playbook to other oil companies

More than 50,000 pages of newly released documents detail how the security firm targeted #pipeline opponents and tried to profit off its #surveillance tactics.

by Alleen Brown & Naveena Sadasivam
Apr 13, 2023

"The Intercept and Grist contacted TigerSwan, #EnergyTransfer, the National Sheriffs’ Association, as well as Thompson, the group’s executive director. None of them responded to requests for comment.

"To TigerSwan, the emergence of #Indigenous-led social movements to keep oil and gas in the ground represented a business opportunity. Reese anticipated new demand from the #FossilFuel industry for strategies to undermine the network of #activists his company had so carefully gathered information on. In the records, TigerSwan expressed its ambitions to repurpose these detailed records to position themselves as experts in managing pipeline protests. The company created marketing materials pitching work to at least two other energy companies building controversial oil and gas infrastructure, the records show. TigerSwan, which was staffed heavily with former members of military special operations units, branded its tactics as a 'counterinsurgency approach,' drawing directly from its leaders’ experiences fighting the so-called War on Terror abroad.

"TigerSwan did not just work in #NorthDakota. Energy Transfer hired the company to provide security to its #RoverPipeline in #Ohio and #WestVirginia, the documents confirm. By spring 2017, TigerSwan was also assembling intelligence reports on opponents of Energy Transfer and #Sunoco’s #MarinerEast2 Pipeline in #Pennsylvania.

"The documents from the North Dakota security board paint a detailed picture of counterinsurgency-style strategies for defeating opponents of oil and gas development, a War-on-Terror security firm’s aspirations to replicate its deceptive tactics far beyond the Northern Great Plains, and the cozy relationship between businesses linked to the fossil fuel industry and one of the largest law enforcement trade associations in the U.S. The impetus for spying was not simply to keep people safe, but to drum up profits from energy clients and to allow fossil fuels to continue flowing, at the expense of the communities fighting for clean water and a healthy climate.

"'For them, it was an opportunity to help create a narrative against our tribe and our supporters,' said Wasté Win Young, a citizen of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the one of the plaintiffs in a class action civil rights lawsuit against TigerSwan and local law enforcement. Young’s social media posts repeatedly showed up in the documents. 'We weren’t motivated by money or payoffs or anything like that. We just wanted to protect our homelands.'"

Full article:
https://grist.org/accountability/tigerswan-documents-dakota-access-pipeline-standing-rock-surveillance/

#ClimateJustice #BigOilAndGas #WaterIsLife #ACAB #StandingRockSioux #StandWithStandingRock #NoDAPL #Activism #ClimateChange
#EnvironmentalJustice

After Spying on #StandingRock Protest, #TigerSwan Shopped Info to Oil Firms

by Alleen Brown and Naveena Sadasivam
04/17/2023

""More than 50,000 pages of documents were recently made public after the company behind the Dakota Access pipeline lost a court case to keep them secret."

"Leaked documents and public records reveal a troubling fusion of private security, public law enforcement, and corporate money in the fight over the Dakota Access pipeline."

"A new business model for breaking down environmental movements was being hatched in real time. On Labor Day weekend in 2016, private security dogs in North Dakota attacked #pipeline opponents led by members of the #StandingRockSioux Tribe as they approached earth-moving equipment. The tribal members considered the land sacred, and the heavy equipment was breaking ground to build the Dakota Access pipeline. With a major public relations crisis on its hands, the pipeline’s parent company, Energy Transfer, hired the firm TigerSwan to revamp its security strategy.

"By October, TigerSwan — founded by James Reese, a retired commander of the elite special operations Army unit Delta Force — had established a military-style pipeline security strategy.

"There was one nagging problem that threatened to unravel it all: Reese hadn’t acquired a security license from the North Dakota Private Investigation and Security Board. Although Reese claimed TigerSwan wasn’t conducting security services at all, the state regulator insisted that its operations were #unlawful without a license."

https://theintercept.com/2023/04/13/standing-rock-tigerswan-protests/

#Activism #ClimateChange
#EnvironmentalJustice #StandWithStandingRock #NoDAPL #Mercenaries #BigOil #ClimateJustice #ACAB

Security Firm Running #DakotaAccessPipeline Intelligence Has Ties to U.S. Military Work in #Iraq and #Afghanistan

By Steve Horn
Oct 28, 2016

"#TigerSwan is one of several security firms under investigation for its work guarding the Dakota Access pipeline in North Dakota while potentially without a permit. Besides this recent work on the #StandingRockSioux protests in #NorthDakota, this company has offices in Iraq and Afghanistan and is run by a special forces Army veteran.

"According to a summary of the investigation, TigerSwan 'is in charge of Dakota Access intelligence and supervises the overall security.'

"The Morton County, North Dakota, Sheriff’s Department also recently concluded that another security company, Frost Kennels, operated in the state while unlicensed to do so and could face criminal charges. The firm’s attack dogs bit #protesters at a heated Labor Day weekend protest.

"Law enforcement and private security at the North Dakota pipeline protests have faced criticism for maintaining a militarized presence in the area. The American Civil Liberties Union (#ACLU) and National Lawyer’s Guild have filed multiple open records requests to learn more about the extent of this #militarization, and over 133,000 citizens have signed a petition calling for the U.S. Department of Justice to intervene and quell the backlash.

"The Federal Aviation Administration has also implemented a no-fly zone, which bars anyone but law enforcement from flying within a 4-mile radius and 3500 feet above the ground in the protest area. #DallasGoldtooth, an organizer on the scenes in North Dakota with the #IndigenousEnvironmentalNetwork, said on Facebook that '#DAPL private security planes and choppers were flying all day' within the designated no-fly zone.

"Donnell Hushka, the designated public information officer for the North Dakota Tactical Operation Center, which is tasked with overseeing the no-fly zone, did not respond to repeated queries about designated private entities allowed to fly in no-fly zone airspace.

"What is TigerSwan?

"TigerSwan has offices in Iraq, Afghanistan, #Jordan, #SaudiArabia, #India, and #LatinAmerica and has headquarters in North Carolina. In the past year, TigerSwan won two U.S. Department of State contracts worth over $7 million to operate in Afghanistan, according to USASpending.gov.

"TigerSwan, however, claims on its website that the contract is worth $25 million, and said in a press release that the State Department contract called for the company to 'monitor, assess, and advise current and future nation building and stability initiatives in Afghanistan.' Since 2008, TigerSwan has won about $57.7 million worth of U.S. government contracts and subcontracts for security services.

"Company founder and CEO James Reese, a veteran of the elite Army Delta Force, served as the 'lead advisor for Special Operations to the Director of the CIA for planning, operations and integration for the invasion of Afghanistan and Operation Enduring Freedom' in Iraq, according to his company biography. Army Delta partakes in mostly covert and high-stakes missions and is part of the U.S. Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), the latter well known for killing Osama Bin Laden.

"One of TigerSwan’s advisory board members, Charles Pittman, has direct ties to the #OilAndGasIndustry. Pittman “served as President of #Amoco Egypt Oil Company, Amoco Eurasia Petroleum Company, and Regional President BP Amoco plc. (covering the #MiddleEast, the Caspian Sea region, Egypt, and India),' according to his company biography.

'Sad, But Not Surprising'

"Investigative journalist #JeremyScahill told #DemocracyNow! in a 2009 interview that TigerSwan did some covert operations work with #Blackwater USA, dubbed the 'world’s most powerful #mercenary army' in his book by the same name. Blackwater has also guarded #OilPipelines in central #Asia, according to Scahill’s book.

"Reese advised Blackwater and took a leave of absence from TigerSwan in 2008 in the aftermath of the #NisourSquareMassacre, a shooting in Iraq conducted by Blackwater officers which saw 17 Iraqi civilians killed. TigerSwan has a business relationship with Babylon Eagles Security Company, a private security firm headquartered in Iraq which also has had business ties with Blackwater.

"'It is sad, but not surprising, that this firm has ties to the US interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq,' Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the women-led peace group #CODEPINK and the co-founder of the human rights group #GlobalExchange, told DeSmog. 'It is another terrifying example of how our violent interventions abroad come home to haunt us in the form of repression and violation of our civil rights.'

"The North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation and the Private Investigation and Security Board are also conducting parallel investigations to the one recently completed by Morton County. TigerSwan did not comment on questions posed about their contract."

https://www.desmog.com/2016/10/28/private-security-firm-dakota-access-iraq-afghanistan-blackwater/

#TigerSwan #BigOil #NoDAPL #Blackwater #HumanRights #Covert #Corporatism #CIA #Corporatocracy
#Corruption #Capitalism #Colonialism #ACAB #ErikPrince #ErikPrinceColonialism