DAPL Pipeline Lawsuit Against Greenpeace Also Aims to Silence Indigenous Protest

As the oil company Energy Transfer sues Greenpeace over the 2016 Standing Rock protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline, we speak with Indigenous activist Winona LaDuke, who took part in that historic uprising. LaDuke is an enrolled member of the Mississippi Band of Anishinaabe who lives and works on the White Earth Nation Reservation and was among the thousands of people who joined the protests in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe to protect water and Indigenous lands in North Dakota. She highlights the close links between North Dakota’s government and Energy Transfer and says that while the lawsuit targets Greenpeace, Indigenous water and land defenders are also on trial. “North Dakota has really been trying to squash any kind of resistance,” says LaDuke. “If they can try to shut down Greenpeace, they’re going to shut down everybody.”

TRANSCRIPT

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AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. To look more at the Greenpeace trial and the criminalization of protest movements, we’re now joined by Winona LaDuke, longtime Indigenous activist and author, an enrolled member of the Mississippi Band of Anishinaabe, who lives and works at the White Earth Nation Reservation. In 2016, she joined others in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux in opposition to the Dakota Access Pipeline to protect water and Indigenous lands in North Dakota. She recently wrote a column for the North Dakota Monitor headlined “Water protectors on trial again as Greenpeace case begins in North Dakota.” Winona LaDuke is joining us today from Eugene, Oregon.

Winona, welcome back to Democracy Now!

WINONA LADUKE: Aaniin. Thank you.

AMY GOODMAN: It’s great to have you with us. Now, the whole idea is: Did Greenpeace lead this movement, what others describe as an Indigenous-led movement, this moment in 2016, this epic gathering of thousands of Indigenous people from North and South America and around the world with their allies at Standing Rock? You were one of them.

WINONA LADUKE: Yeah, I had no idea Greenpeace was there, actually. And I think a lot of Indigenous people didn’t. We all came for the water. We came there because Indigenous people, Lakota people, LaDonna, all called us there. I came because we had just defeated another pipeline in Minnesota, that then went — Enbridge went and spent 28 — purchased 28% of the Energy Transfer Partners pipeline. So, you know, we all went out there for the water. And so, I was surprised at this case, but not surprised at the tactics of North Dakota, which is all about squashing any kind of civil dissent, having any kind of democracy, from what I can see. It’s very — you know, North Dakota is not a good state in terms of democracy. We’ll put it that way.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Winona, could you talk about how this case relates to another case in which you were a witness, North Dakota v. U.S.A., and how this fits into the state’s push to cover the $38 million they spent on the military presence at Standing Rock?

WINONA LADUKE: Yes, of course. I mean, there were thousands of us out there. I was out there for quite a bit of time. I witnessed, you know, everything that Energy Transfer Partners did to the best of my ability. I saw that they unleashed dogs on people. So they did, in fact, cause bodily harm to people. We saw it happen. And, you know, there was a lot of military out there. Thirty-eight million dollars is what was the toll they said, the cost for North Dakota. And that was all kind of equipment. Now, North Dakota has been trying to recover that. They got a bunch back, you know, money. Energy Transfer Partners gave them some.

But in March of this last year, 2024, I was a federal witness in the North Dakota v. U.S. case in Bismarck. And in that case, the state of North Dakota had alleged that because the Army Corps of Engineers had issued a conditional use permit for the area that we all camped upon, that they suggested that the Army Corps of Engineers had enabled us to all go, called us all to Standing Rock. And so, surprisingly enough, I was a federal witness, which I’ve never been a federal witness, that the federal government called me up and asked me if I would testify if I went to Standing Rock because they issued a permit. I said, “Hell no. I went there because LaDonna asked me to go. I went there for the water.” So, North Dakota has been trying to figure out how to kind of save face and have somebody else pay for what they did, put the blame on someone else for their poor behavior and their selling of the state of North Dakota, selling of the water of North Dakota over the human rights of not just Indigenous people, but everyone. So I was a federal witness in March of last year, and I’ve been watching these cases.

There’s been a lot of cases in North Dakota, and they have not gone well for water protectors. You know, there is 800 people charged. And most of those cases were dismissed by the North Dakota courts under this, I think it’s called, qualified immunity, which is when you can, like, you know, shoot at water protectors, and it’s considered qualified immunity, even if you’re on the turret of a tank basically volleying rounds at people. So, you know, North Dakota has really been trying to squash any kind of resistance. And this Greenpeace case is very significant to North Dakota, because if they can try to shut down Greenpeace, they’re going to shut down everybody, including all those farmers who don’t want the new carbon sequestration pipelines coming their way. You know, this is how North Dakota is trying to operate.

AMY GOODMAN: Winona, I want to ask you about the former North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum, who is now secretary of the interior, right? He replaces the first Indigenous Cabinet member, who was Deb Haaland. Burgum selecting — is a major supporter of oil and gas drilling, to oversee the bureaucracy tasked with managing U.S. lands and natural resources. So, I want to go back to 2017, when he ordered an eviction of a resistance camp set up by Lakota water protectors opposing DAPL, the Dakota Access Pipeline. As governor, he has signed a near-total abortion ban into law, a ban on trans girls and women from participating in school sports, legislation banning the teaching of critical race theory. That’s just background on him, now in charge of land around the country. The significance of that and how it affects what you’re doing?

WINONA LADUKE: Well, the other thing is, is that he is a former executive. I think it’s in Great Plains Microsoft. And so, basically, Burgum has been selling North Dakota to the Big Tech companies or the — for AI, for these centers that are out there in the middle of, like, Ellendale, North Dakota, setting up huge energy systems, talking about mini nukes to power all the AI facilities that he wants to put in North Dakota. So, Burgum’s idea of what North Dakota should look like is not a good idea for North Dakota at all. And the fact that he’s now secretary of interior means that he’s going to try to take the North Dakota model and make it bigger. You know, Doug Burgum is not a friend of Indian people.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you so much for being with us, Winana. Winona LaDuke, longtime Indigenous activist and author, enrolled member of the Mississippi Band of Anishinaabe who lives and works on the White Earth Nation Reservation in northern Minnesota, author of To Be a Water Protector: The Rise of the Wiindigoo Slayers. We’ll link to her recent column in the North Dakota Monitor headlined “Water protectors on trial again as Greenpeace case begins in North Dakota.”

Coming up, we look at the Oscar-nominated film Sugarcane, an investigation into the devastating abuse at Indian residential schools in Canada. Stay with us.