TWH – While opponents of the Keystone XL pipeline succeeded in halting its construction, another oil pipeline is nearing completion despite resistance. This other pipeline, Line 3, will replace and enlarge a currently existing pipeline.
Line 3 cuts across Ojibwe lands in Minnesota and threatens the wild rice crop of the Ojibwe tribe. It also threatens the Ojibwe waterways and the Mississippi’s headwaters.
The Ojibwe, the Chippewa, and other tribes belong to the Anishinaabe cultural and linguistic group. Line 3 is being built by Enbridge, a Canadian natural gas distribution company. Enbridge says the pipeline will offer “thousands of local jobs and a safer alternative to the aging existing pipeline.” Close to 800 people have been arrested trying to stop the pipeline’s construction.
Map showing the ancestral homeland of the Objibwe; Image credit: By Noahedits – CC BY-SA 4.0
Native America Calling broadcast an hour-long discussion about Line 3 and resistance to it. The following people took part in that discussion. Ogimaa Giniw Ikwe, a journalist and member of the Red Lake Nation, Paul Eberth, Director for U.S. Tribal Engagement for Enbridge, Winona LaDuke, member of the Missippi Band of Anishinaabe who serves as Executive Director of Honor the Earth, and Taysha Martineau, a member of the Fond Du Lac Band of Ojibwe helped to start Camp Migizi, and is also a water protector. (Note: As a two-Spirit, Martineau uses the pronoun, “they.”)
Martineau explained tribal relationships. The Fond Du Lac Band is “one of the six Minnesota Ojibway tribes that make up the Minnesota Ojibway tribe.”
Climate Change and Line 3
LaDuke linked opposition to Line 3 to opposition to climate change. She said, “It’s time to move on. I lived my whole life in the fossil fuel era, I would like a way out. Electric cars are 65% more efficient.”
LaDuke said it’s a shame for the Biden Administration to “let something continue with such corporate privileging.” She continued, “This [Line 3] is the equivalent of 50 new coal-fired power plants.”
LaDuke said she wants “the system to work. We want Joe Biden to do an environmental impact statement because there was not a federal environmental impact statement done on this project.” Bluntly, she said, “We want them to pull the permit.”
According to climate activist and author, Bill McKibben in The New York Times, Line 3 will have a new route and carry twice as much oil as the pipeline that it’s replacing. It will run from the tar sands deposits in Alberta, Canada across Ojibwe lands in Minnesota, to Superior, Wisconsin, carrying almost the same amount of oil as the now-canceled Keystone XL oil pipeline.
McKibben described the oil that Line 3 would carry as “among the most carbon-heavy petroleum on the planet.” McKibben urged Biden to “pause construction on Line 3.”
The opposition to the Line 3 pipeline has taken many forms, including both civil disobedience and legal challenges. Opponents of the Line 3 pipeline have set up camps around construction sites. The opponents call themselves “water protectors” rather than protestors.
One of the many protests at the Minnesota Capitol in St. Paul (March 2018) – Image credit: Fibonacci Blue – CC BY 2.0,
Native sovereignty issues
Traditional Native American relationships with the earth involve relationships and obligations. LaDuke described wild rice as the Anishinaabe’s most sacred food. Martineau said the water protectors are looking to “protect these lands for future generations.” They continued, “We are here to ensure that our relatives continue utilizing this land as is their inherent right as indigenous people.”
Ikwe said that the majority of the Anishinaabe people are concerned “for water. They are concerned [for the] wild rice.” She said that they have concerns for “the history and the future of our sovereignty. Because this oil pipeline [was] put down in Minnesota through treaty territory, without the permission or approval of more than one nation.”
Divisions among Native Americans
One Native American group, the Fond Du Lac Band of Ojibwe, supports the pipeline. This complicates matters. Some water protectors, like Martinez, are also members of Fond Du Lac Band of Ojibwe.
Many members of the Fond Du Lac Band work for Enbridge on the pipeline. LaDuke said “Enbridge created bitter divisions in our communities. Family member against family member. Tribe against tribe.”
Martineau spoke of the divisions in their tribe. “Have I yelled at police officers? Absolutely, I’ll probably do it again. Have I yelled at pipeline workers? Yes, I absolutely have. I’ll probably do it again. When it comes to the situation here in Fond Du Lac, when it comes to our law enforcement officers, these are tribal officers. I know these men. I’ve sat in ceremony with these men. They have fed my children. I have also fed them and their children. We’re relatives out here. Do families fight? You bet your ass we do. Especially when it comes to the destruction of the land that we are part of.”
Civil Disobedience
Martineau described Camp Migizi as a camp of “mostly queer and two-spirit” people using “nonviolent direct action to stop this pipeline. We’ve been at this fight since January.”
On June 7, The New York Times reported on a mass arrest of water protectors resisting the construction of Line 3. The water protectors had used an “old fishing boat, bamboo and steel cable to blockade the road to a construction site.” Other water protectors climbed over the fences and occupied the site, blocking construction. Police in riot gear began making arrests.
The Lawyers Guild said that more than 100 people were arrested. The New York Times reported that the police used “what appeared to be a crowd-dispersing sonic device known as an LRAD, or Long Range Acoustic Device, on the protesters.”
Accusations of Violence
Several pro-pipeline people on the broadcast spoke about water protector violence. No one, however, mentioned any specific incidents of water protector violence. A quick Google search on September 5, failed to find any reports of water protector violence. Eberth, representing Enbridge on the broadcast, also failed to specify any violent incidents.
The Guardian did, however, report specific incidents of sexual violence. Some pipeline workers have harassed or assaulted indigenous women. Two were arrested for sex trafficking. Energy News also reported a similar pattern. They quoted Staci Reay, executive director of the Violence Intervention Project. Reay said, “When any type of mobile workforce like this comes to town, I think there’s always going to be an increase in violent situations.”
First Peoples Worldwide, a project of the University of Colorado, has issued a report about this issue. That report linked increased sexual violence against indigenous women to the mobile workforce. The oil and gas boom in the northern US and southern Canada is driving that mobile workforce.
Recent Developments
Minnesota Public Radio reported that on August 25, over 1,000 people gathered at the Minnesota State Capital. At that rally, they vowed to continue their opposition to the Line 3 pipeline.
In August, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled in favor of continuing the project. The pipeline is reaching completion. Reuters reported that Enbridge has announced that Line 3 will be functional, and by October, it will start pumping 620,000 barrels per day.
Martineau compared reports of Line 3 nearing completion to statements of Keystone officials. They kept repeating that the Keystone pipeline was 85% complete. They did so right up until the end. But people kept opposing the Keystone pipeline. More importantly, they stopped it.
For more information, here are links for Honor the Earth, or Camp Migizi. On Twitter, use the hashtag #StopLinethree for the latest updates on the pipeline protest.
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