By If you’ve been glued to the emerging news on the Keystone XL pipeline like the RAN team has today then you already know that a final decision on this disastrous extreme energy project has been further delayed. Today, the Obama administration extended the review period on the pipeline to ostensibly give agencies more time to provide feedback. You’re going to see a lot of quarterbacking on what this potential delay does or does not mean for the eventual fate of this pipeline. Here’s what we know for sure.
The Keystone XL tar sands pipeline fight is and will continue to be a defining moment for the history of the climate movement, and it’s not over. We have to maintain bold, powerful pressure on President Obama and the State Department. Make no mistake, though, the pressure is working. The fact that this pipeline was not rubber-stamped as expected two years ago reflects the huge public outcry we’ve built collectively against Keystone XL and for sane climate solutions.
We know that people power is on our side and has already changed the historical fate of this project. As organizers, we also know that our dirty oil adversaries are hoping this delay will take the wind out of our sails, that we’ll forget about Keystone XL and lose momentum. I have nearly 100,000 reasons to prove that’s not going to happen.
For the last twelve months, Rainforest Action Network, CREDO and the Other 98% have spearheaded an effort to prepare tens of thousands of people across the country to deploy a massive nationwide wave of peaceful, dignified civil disobedience if Secretary Kerry recommends approval of Keystone XL to the president. As of today, more than 95,000 people have signed the Pledge of Resistance.
As Elijah Zarlin, CREDO’s senior campaign manager said today: “It is deeply disappointing that Secretary Kerry and President Obama can’t yet muster the courage to stand up to the oil industry and reject Keystone XL. Still, this is yet another defeat for TransCanada, tar sands developers like the Koch Brothers, and oil-soaked politicians. No doubt, the nearly 100,000 people who have pledged to risk arrest to stop Keystone XL played a key role in pushing the administration to more accurately consider the full impact of this project – which must clearly result in rejection. No delays will diminish our commitment to stopping Keystone XL.”
I am one of the almost 100,000 people who’ve signed the Pledge of Resistance, and I can guarantee that today’s news changes nothing for me. I’m not going away, RAN’s not going away and neither are any of our allies. When I signed that pledge I knew it was for the long haul. Our future depends on it.
Photo by Kayana Szymczak.