Dakota Access Pipeline



The Dakota Access Pipeline is a petroleum pipeline that would have run through (or at least near) the Standing Rock Native American reservation in North Dakota, had former President Barack Obama not canceled its lease. It is alleged to violate age-old treaties made with the Sioux, and provoked protests that led to Obama demanding its rerouting.

On January 24, 2017, then-President Donald Trump signed an executive order to advance the construction of the pipeline under "terms and conditions to be negotiated". The order would expedite the environmental review that Trump described as an "incredibly cumbersome, long, horrible permitting process".

The pipeline finished construction in April 2017, and has been operational since June 2017.

How close to the Standing Rock reservation?
The maps showing that the pipeline would have run through the Standing Rock reservation were based on a treaty signed in the 1830s, which itself was superseded by another signed in the 1870s. The current map for the Standing Rock reservation shows that the pipeline would not have run through any portion of the reservation, but still would have approached within a few miles of it.

The pipeline would have come near Lake Oahe, and the potential threat to the local water supply did merit serious attention. However, claims that this lake was "sacred to the Sioux for centuries" are bogus -- the lake didn't exist until it was created by Oahe Dam in 1948. (Ironically, the construction of this dam displaced many Native Americans who had previously been living near the river's shoreline.)

Police brutality
During a protest on November 20, 2016, 21-year-old Sophia Wilansky was critically injured when she was struck with a concussion grenade, and the police unleashed dogs on protestors, as well as tear gas and frigid water. Over 117 people were arrested, with Native American protestors being handed the longest prison sentences, with cases of entrapment by federal agents.

Corporate conspiracy and standard conspiracying

 * The DAPL Company started a RICO lawsuit accusing various environmental organizations of inciting protests to increase donations.
 * There were also false claims that protesters were sprayed with chemicals from crop duster planes.
 * There were also accusations of the police setting a protest camp on fire, a police sniper shooting and killing an eleven year old girl, that it was a false flag operation driven by greed and celebrity-seeking.