Rainforest Action Network and CREDO prepare to unleash wave of civil disobedience
San Francisco, CA — As Friday’s deadline nears to submit public comments opposing the Keystone XL pipeline, progressive groups CREDO and Rainforest Action Network have collected more than 169,000 comments to the State Department urging Sec. Kerry to reject the Keystone XL pipeline, while simultaneously preparing to unleash a massive wave of civil disobedience if Sec. Kerry allows the State Department to continue ignoring the facts on Keystone XL, and recommends approval of the toxic tar sands pipeline to President Obama.
CREDO, Rainforest Action Network and the Other 98% are organizing around the Pledge of Resistance, where more than 86,000 people have signed up to commit peaceful, civil disobedience if Secretary Kerry recommends that the president approve the Keystone XL pipeline. With grassroots momentum building against the pipeline following the mass student arrests last weekend, 10,000 additional people have signed the pledge in the past week alone.
“If Secretary Kerry truly believes that climate change is a weapon of mass destruction — then he must oppose the carbon bomb that is Keystone XL,” said Elijah Zarlin, CREDO’s senior campaign manager and formerly a senior national email writer on President Obama’s 2008 campaign. “Secretary Kerry inherited a mess in the State Department’s evaluation process, and more than 86,000 Americans stand ready to risk arrest if he fails to recognize the climate impact of this disastrous project.”
“The Keystone XL pipeline locks us into the fossil-fuel future of our nightmares,” said Amanda Starbuck, Rainforest Action Network’s Climate Program Director. “We’re proud to stand with more than 86,000 people who are committed to the legacy we leave for our children and their children, people who feel so strongly that they are prepared to put their bodies on the line by risking going to jail.”
To date, CREDO has collected 141,428 public comments and Rainforest Action Network has collected 27,638 public comments to the State Department in opposition of the Keystone XL pipeline. CREDO and Rainforest Action Network will join a host of other groups in delivering large numbers of public comments on Friday.
Read the Pledge of Resistance here: http://nokxl.org/wp-content/kxl_pledge.html
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