Native Sun News Today: Court reversal lets DAPL oil flow

Wednesday, August 12, 2020  

WASHINGTON, D.C. – On August 5, a three-judge panel here reversed lower court orders so that oil may continue to flow through the Dakota Access Pipeline while hearings proceed on an appeal of a ruling to withdraw DAPL’s permit to cross the Missouri River just upstream from the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s drinking water intake.

In March, a district judge invalidated the permit issued to pipeline builder Energy Transfer Partners and associates four years ago by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers because it violated the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to carefully consider the dangers posed to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. In July, he ordered the oil flow shut off.

In the reversal on the same day the oil flow was supposed to cease, the panel, seated at the U.S. District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals, also ruled to let stand that lower court’s order to withdraw the permit pending an environmental review, effectively creating a situation in which the pipeline is operating illegally.

BREAKING: On the day that had been initially set as a deadline for shutting down the Dakota Access Pipeline, a federal appeals court today issued an order that effectively allows oil to continue flowing for now. #NoDAPL https://t.co/dzSZtu2Fw1

— Earthjustice (@Earthjustice) August 5, 2020

Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chair Mike Faith hailed the decision as a milestone on tribes’ long crusade against the pipeline route through unceded treaty territory. “As the environmental review process gets underway in the months ahead, we look forward to showing why the Dakota Access Pipeline is too dangerous to operate,” he said.

Earthjustice attorney Jan Hasselman, one of many lawyers for the Standing Rock, Cheyenne River, Yankton, and Oglala Sioux tribes in the pipeline battle, explained, “The pipeline is now operating illegally.” But, he said, “We are confident that it will be shut down eventually.”

It falls to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which issued the now-invalid permit, to decide whether to exercise its authority to shut down the pipeline. The issue will go back to the lower court for more proceedings on that count if the Corps doesn’t.

U.S. President Donald Trump has ordered the agency to do everything in its power to facilitate the pipeline.

Contact Talli Nauman at talli.nauman@gmail.com