FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 25, 2012
Contact: Ron Seifert: 843-814-2796 and at ronseif@gmail.com
A Call for Nonviolent Direct Action to Stop the Keystone XL Pipeline from the Tar Sands Blockade
Texas—This summer, environmental activists from across the country will be converging in Texas to blockade the Gulf Coast portion of the Keystone XL pipeline.
The Tar Sands Blockade will be coordinating nonviolent direct actions along the pipeline route to stop the zombie pipeline once and for all. We are working with national allies as well as local communities to coordinate a road show that will travel throughout Texas and Oklahoma as well as a regional training effort for activists interested in getting involved in the blockade movement against the Keystone XL.
“Our action is giving a new meaning to ‘Don’t Mess with Texas,’ says Tar Sands Blockade Collective Member Benjamin Kessler. Kessler is also a member of Rising Tide North Texas and Iraq Veterans Against the War.
Tar sands giant TransCanada will be granted permits for construction of the Gulf Coast portion of the pipeline from the Texas Army Corp of Engineers as early as today. President Obama announced he wanted to expedite the ‘Gulf Coast Project’ earlier this year when he gave his ‘all of the above’ energy address in Cushing, Oklahoma.
The Keystone XL remains key to the expansion of the Alberta tar sands, and leading NASA Climate Scientist James Hansen has called the pipeline “a fuse to the largest carbon bomb on the planet.” According to Hansen, if the carbon stored in the tar sands is released into the atmosphere, it would mean “game over for the climate.”
350.org Founder Bill McKibben has worked hard to get Hansen’s message out to the public and to lawmakers in Washington. After more than 1,200 were arrested during the onset of the Tar Sands Action last fall, and another
12,000 turned out to surround the White House to tell President Obama that the Keystone XL is not in the nation’s best interest. McKibben was elated to hear that the Tar Sands Blockade is continuing to foster the spirit of resistance against the pipeline in the south with the use of nonviolent direct action.
“Let’s be clear what the drama is here: human bodies and spirits up against the unlimited cash and political influence of the fossil fuel industry. We all should be grateful for this peaceful witness,” McKibben said.
Because this is an export pipeline, working Americans will pay the cost of environmental destruction, and never see any of the profits.
“The pipeline will make TransCanada rich while encroaching on ranch land, poisoning Texas’ working class communities, and destroying the environment that makes the Lone Star state so beautiful,” says Tar Sands Blockade Spokesperson Ron Seifurt.
This is not a political issue as much as President Obama and Governor Romney would like it to be in this divisive election year. This is a community issue. Ranchers, landowners, green activists, occupiers and self-identified tea party members are currently working together in common interest to stop the Keystone XL pipeline in Texas.
Tar sands oil threatens streams, water tables, grasslands, forests—all of which families along the pipeline route need to survive. Texas landowners are organizing on their own to stop the pipeline, and we are doing everything we can to help them.
For more information visit http://tarsandsblockade.org/
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Rising Tide North America is an all-volunteer climate justice network with over 50 chapter, allies and local contacts throughout Canada, Mexico and the United States that works to confront the root causes of climate change.
Rising Tide North Texas, based in Denton, TX, is the North Texas chapter of Rising Tide North America.
