As the record high heat wave of one hundred and seventeen degrees hit my hometown of Portland, Oregon, in late June one, I was facing down baton wielding county sheriffs in the forests of Minnesota. Originally I was going out of town to attend the twenty twenty one Earth First
Summer Gathering. I learned about it from some online friends, and since I was already deep into research for this very podcast, I figured this would be the perfect opportunity to learn from people who have been fighting against climate change longer than I have been alive. I arrived in Minneapolis in the early morning of June and then up put someone to make the four hour drive north into
the lake dense forests of Minnesota. By the time we arrived at the earth First camp, who was already dark in the mosquito filled woods and it started to rain. I could of myself indeed bug spray and scrambled to set up my tent and rain flow. I It was a long day. My exhaustion coupled with the rain, maybe not bother to inflate my sleeping pad, a decision I would soon regret. Come morning, I woke up with a moist, sore back into the sound of a loud ringing bell
and someone yelling breakfast for me. That meant it was time for morning coffee. I suppose before I get any further, it would be useful to explain what exactly Earth First is for those who are unfamiliar. Earth First is an environmental movement focused on the protection and defense of nature, the wilderness, and wildlife. It was sounded in nineteen eighty as an alternative to other mainstream environmental organizations that were seen as too moderate and willing to sacrifice demands and
goals to make deals with lawmakers and corporations. Earth First invented the slogan no compromise and defensive Mother Earth to demonstrate their commitment to their more radical ideals. Some of its earliest inspirations were non anthropocentric philosophies such as biocentrism
and eventually deep ecology. Earth First was also in part inspired by Edward Abbey's nineteen seventy five book The Monkey Wrench Gang, which follows a small gaggle of radical environmentalists as they travel around the Western United States doing various tax as, sabotage, attacking the machinery, and infrastructure that are harming the planet. The novel became so ubiquitous that the
word monkey wrenching became a synonym for eco sabotage. A few things set earth First apart from other more mainstream environmental groups. Its non formal, largely non hierarchical organization structure resulted in a loose network of local autonomous groups as opposed to a national membership based organization. Its tactics were more focused on civil disobedience and direct action rather than
lobbying and political deal making. Direct Action such as body blockades, tree sits, and tree spiking i e. Putting metal rods or nails and trees to prevent them from being cut, gave earth First national media coverage, which in turn got more people involved with actions. Earth First also launched a magazine journal, which served as a public face and gave earth firsters info and tips on direct action and different writings on biocentrism. Around the early nineteen nineties, the organization
faced some growing pains. Debate between more performative protests and get the goods style direct action is common in activist spaces, and earth First was no different. After a nine Earth First summer gathering, in the UK, some activists, frustrated by the increasingly mainstream and more hierarchical version of the Earth First organization with an emphasis on civil disobedience over sabotaged, formed a spinoff group called the Earth Liberation Front or
the e LF. Earth First continue operating the journal and doing tree sets, blockades, civil disobedience, and occupation style protests. While the ELF took credit for tree spiking, fire bombings, and more fiery and instructive direct actions. Inevitably, business leaders, politicians, law enforcement authorities, and many others would rise up to attack these activists. The FBI labeled them the number one domestic terrorism threat in two thousand one and began work
to suppress the entire green movement. This culminated in the Green Scare of the two thousands, a federal crackdown and mass surveillance project against environmental activism that was also in part fueled by the heightened anti terror fervor post and eleven and the terrorism enhancements in the Patriot Act. FBI investigations and subsequent grand juries broke many of the actives communities active at the time and scared more into hiding.
Many are still imprisoned today, quoting Braun Taylor, a professor of environmentalism at the University of California, quote often complimented by lawsuits, The radical environmental movement had no small number of victories in the nineties, although the victories were often small. Nevertheless, the perception of the movement's activists were that they were losing overall and badly, and moreover, that the government was not only corrupt and the cahoots with the industry, but
increasingly repressive. Such perceptions reinforced an increasingly common view in the movement that the time had come to a shoe above ground tactics and create an underground resistance movement. By the mid ninety nineties, there was a proliferation of such tactics.
Between then and the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center two thousand and one, at least twenty activists deployed arson as a tactic torturing gas guzzling sports utility vehicles, a ski lodge being built in the habitat of a threatened species of Canadian links in Colorado, a forced service office in Oregon, and trophy homes being built in ecologically sensitive areas, to name but a few of these incendiary incidents. Welly sorts of tactics have drawn the bulk of the
media's attention to these movements. Significant environmental victories have been won or contributed to by radical environmentalists. In January one, for example, the United States Forced Service under President Bill Clinton issued the Roadless Area Conservation Rule, which protects over fifty eight million acres of federal forest lands. Although it took more than a decade of legal battles for imponents of this rule to exhaust their legal challenges to it,
it eventually became law of the land. It is inconceivable that the government would have issued this important rule in the absence of a decade of strong and disruptive resistance to the Force Services Timber program bi radical environmentalists. Although the rule did not provide everything the radical environmental activists sought, it was a significant advance from biodiversity conservation in North America.
Every day at the Earth First Camp followed a rough pattern wake up and breakfast call around seven, then a morning circle where folks lay out the plan for the day and make announcements. After that, the late morning to early afternoon is split up into three time blocks for various workshops at different sections of the camp, with lunch somewhere in between time slots. Once workshops are done, it's dinner time by the lake, and then usually some sort
of evening activity. The workshops covered a broad range of topics, from how to climb a tree to how to do comfort resolution. Many were pre planned, but if you had a skill you wanted to share, time was set aside to do an impromptu workshop. The main workshops were on Indigenous solidarity and land Back, the History of Earth First, Slash, the Radical Green Movement, and an Overview slash discussion on direct action. Direct action is about literally taking direct action
in hopes of achieving a tangible goal. It's not simply a protest march. Direct action means actually getting something done. People who call themselves Earth First are usually known for doing direct actions that temporarily inconvenience those who wish to harm the planet, while also trying to gain positive media attention or optics to grow massive support of the overall
green movement. Examples of these actions include tree sits and lockdowns, more permanent and destructive tactics, and direct actions like burning down an ecologically distry active ski resort construction site or torching high carbon emitting luxury SUVs were more associated with the ELF or the Earth Liberation Front. The Direct Action workshop went over many examples of direct actions from years
passed and around the globe. People discussed what goals the actions may have had, if the actions achieved that goal, the different risks of participating in the action, and what the public perception might have been, all of which are important things to consider when planning an action. Also discussed was slight deception as a useful tool for planning the risk and optics of an action. A past protest was
shown as an example. At that protest, Indigenous folks were attached to fake chains so it looks like they were locked onto equipment while standing in front of a large message banner for media attention and pictures. Meanwhile, white protesters behind them were locked down to actual equipment, thus putting the indigenous activists at the center of media coverage while having white folks bear the brunt of the burden of state repression. A green activism classic are body blockades. Generally
there are two types, hard and soft. Soft blockades are just bodies linked together. Hard blockades use lock boxes, typically made out of metal or plastic tubes that people attach their limbs to on the inside, that are then attached around equipment machinery, train tracks, or gates. Other hard blockades can use technology like bipods or tripods to suspend people up in the air to physically block off a space. Innovation and experimentation are key to the success of these devices.
The state already knows of and how to quickly counter most popular lock box designs, though rule policing areas may be less trained on how to counter these more militant tactics. Having a publicly announced protest march serve as a sort of distraction action as other folks can do shenanigans and monkey wrenching behind the scenes at other spots was mentioned as a useful idea, but one that's rarely utilized. There were also discussions of other activism and direct action related concepts,
such as affinity groups and security culture. An affinity group is essentially your specific small crew of people that you are with at an action. You all watch out for each other and usually have linked goals. Security culture is a broader concept that we don't have tons of time to get into today, but one aspect of it is is that there's information that you, your friends, and especially strangers don't need to share or sometimes even know about
at all. A good security culture habit to get into is thinking about if sharing details or even letting it be known that you have knowledge of certain things could put people at risk before you say anything at all to anyone. This includes bragging about things, especially direct actions that you may or may not have participated in in the past, even if you're telling a quote unquote trusted group of friends or on your quote anonymous Twitter account.
Another big discussion point was risk assessment, knowing what risks you can and can't take for whatever reasons, both at actions and during the planning process, and then trying to plant accordingly to set yourself up for the best possible outcome. This, by no means always works out, but it's still a good thing to practice and something that may save your skin. One method of trying to suss out rough risk levels is the stoplight system, which divides actions into green, yellow,
and red. These are areas of the physical protest space and or specific rules linked to different levels of risk. Green means that you plan on getting out of the protests without getting arrested. This includes stuff like protest theater, holding signs and banners, doing legal support work, doing protest extraction i e. Going around in a car, picking up folks as they're trying to leave an escalating situation, or even just standing in a large group to help anonymize
other folks in the crowd, doing more mischievous actions. Yellow means that you'd rather get out of the protests without getting arrested, but you may be in scenarios where that's slightly more likely to happen. This includes being a part of the shield slash umbrella walls, attempting d arrests, perhaps throwing a water bottle at an armed man with a badge. Being able to move quickly is a really useful skill
for folks that take up yellow rolls. Red means that you plan on being arrested, whether it be for tree sitting or locking down to the gate of ice facility to temporarily prevent the transportation of immigrants, among other possibilities. Also included in this category are people who get arrested for optics purposes, although getting arrested solely in hopes of getting good media coverage is a point of contention in
certain activists circles. The stop flight method is by no means perfect or applicable in every scenario, but I included it here as an example of one way to do very basic risk assessment related to organizing practicing split second in group decision making was also discussed as a really good habit to get into. Things like a D and D and role playing games are great ways to do this. As an RPG party is very much like an affinity group, and in the end, it's important to remember actions have
the potential to be empowering and achieve measurable change. Sometimes you can do both, sometimes just one, and sometimes neither. At the end of Earth First Gathering is there's usually
some sort of project or direct action. As we were in northern Minnesota, it was a decent assumption that this one would be related to the Line three pipeline currently being constructed across the Minnesota wilderness, including underneath lakes, wet lands growing sacred wild rice, and the Mississippi River headwaters. People from the nearby stop Line three protest camp named the may Wog came over to the Earth First Gathering a few times, either to hang out or attend workshops.
A panel of Indigenous folks from the GNU Collective and Indigenous Women and Two Spirit led Frontline Resistance group drove from the Stop Plane three camp and gave a wonderful panel on land back and how to show Indigenous solidarity. Monday, June, Day three of the week long gathering, started out like any other day thus far. The early morning wake up bell that my Pacific time zone brain was slowly adjusting
to coffee and breakfast, and then morning circle. Today I planned on strapping on a harness and doing some tree climbing at the training setup they had in camp. But during morning circle we had a surprise announcement at the Stop Plane three camp near Park Rapids, Minnesota, situated on
a piece of private property owned by the activists. Mind you, the Hubbard County Sheriff's had shown up at six am with a piece of paper that said they would be blocking off access to the driveway leading to the private property, letting us suspicious, obscure and never before enforced land use ordinance, saying that the property owners didn't have an official easeman to use the driveway. Part of the paper read quote the trail will be barricaded beginning on June at ten am.
Beveagles not be allowed to enter for any reason after this time. Beagles driving on this Hubbard County owned trail or in violation of the Hubbard County land Use Ordinance and enforcement action will be taken by the Hubbard County Sheriff's Office unquote. This also meant that vehicles were not allowed to leave, effectively trapping people inside with limited cell
service and supplies. Water has to be hauled in from a nearby town into the Nomawag camp and the camp property has no utility hookups and it's only accessible via this driveway that runs through one fifty foot strip of public land owned by Hubbard County. The land use ordinance has only been around since two thous and seven, and the driveway in question has been around for at least over four decades, according to land records and aerial photographs.
Plus basic property law, use dictates that you can't landlock someone, and usually for property to even be sold, it needs to have access to a public road. The previous owner of the property actually did get a non exclusive eastment prior to selling and has given the new owner's permission to use their easement as it only expires in the vent of non use. To make things even more legally complicated, Hubbard Counties blockade of the driveway may actually be in
violation of treaty law. Quoting an article by Karen Savage, an investigative journalist who reports on climate change related litigation and environmental justice. Quote Frank B. Bu, executive director of the eighteen fifty five Treaty Authority, which represents approximately twenty five thousand Chippewa tribal members who are currently beneficiaries of the eighteen fifty five Chippewa Treaty with the United States, says the matter was settled more than a century ago.
The eighteen fifty five treaty grants the Chippewa a superior federal perpetual conservation easement and the right to access quote public lands and public waters using public roads unquote. I'll explain how this particular legal issue gets resolved in the next episode, but suffice to say sheriff of blocking the driveway and probably illegally. A new collective put out a call for assistance and requests for people to attempt to
bring in supplies. So people at the first camp organized a caravan of cars with people willing to protect the No May Walk camp and bring in food and water. Most of our regular plans of the day were postponed as about half the Earth First camp decided to go help. Jail support forms were filled out and people wrote to the jail support numbers on their body and so around noon I hopped in a Prius and began the two
hour drive towards No May Wog. I could tell we were getting close by the number of Hubbard County Sheriff's vehicles passing us, white pickup trucks emblazoned with sheriffs in that cool cop font you know the one. Soon enough, the fifteen car long caravan from Earth First past the Line three construction site. As we drove by, I stared at the miles of pipe on top of overturned soil
and trees. Near the end of the drive, the car I was then lost the vehicle ahead of us that we were supposed to be following, So we decided to tail one of the cop cars going in the same direction, figuring we would all be heading to the same place, and we were correct. Once we arrived at the spot, we just pulled up behind the rest of the Earth First caravan, already multiple cop cards were blocking the entrance
to the Maywog. While sitting idle and all still inside our vehicles, a share S deputy walked by, writing down all the license plate numbers and issuing a warning, you guys gotta leave or else your vehicles gonna get ton Okay. After waiting inside the vehicles for a bit, folks from the supply and support caravan and started to trickle out
and head towards the Maywog and the cops. There's a lot of arguing about the driveway in the Eastman situation, which allegedly brought the cops out in the first place. If you've ever tried arguing with cops in the street before, you'll be able to guess that this was a mostly pointless affair. We have you guys got off the road because we're gonna start moving. Let us give our supplies to our friends and then we'll fucking leave. We're not you guys. You guys have the abilities handker stuff. It's
built on county land. It's a fucking driveway. Looking at it, you're gonna die on this. Yeah. If this is a white driveway for a bunch of this is a driveway for a bunch of white people in it and I out. You know, you guys, are they all ones? Bring off race? You don't have. As the day trigged on, the law enforcement presence grew more and more and more schriffs showing up. Um, well, cheffs shift deputies, quite a few of them, UM hobably around. I don't know twenty is here now, about thirty maybe
like thirty five protesters, aren't you know? People from the nearby nearby First First camp trying to bring supplies to the stop the Line three camp about two hours away. Um, so some of the people here on the ground are are from the stop Line three camp, some are from their first camp. UM with about twenty ten fifteen cars trying trying to be trying to be surpries as well. It's currently being blocked off by the county sheriffs to today for the first time today they've they've chosen to
a block off road access to the city camp. Since the comps were blocking off the road, the caravan from Earth First couldn't pull into the private property and had to park on the side of the county road. As we all waited to see how this was going to
turn out. Soon enough, a tow truck arrived. So we have a tow truck just arrived and is starting to tow some of the cars that are from the Earth First camp who came here to bring supplies UM to the stop the Line three camp that since since the roadways have been blocked off, so they're unable to transfer supply from the road UM to get to the stop Line three camp. And right now there is a currently it's like the first car being towed and all the way into the back. I'm walking over there right now.
It's about like four sheriffs, sheriff's deputies and some people that are obviously not thrilled about getting their cars towed, given though we're on like a public road and they're just parked because they're trying to get through and the cops are blocking them. Stuff's getting because stuffs getting more tense by the by the by the tow truck area.
UM sheriffs are getting pretty obviously piste UM people are have vested interest in not getting their vehicles stone but trying to bring supplies to a protest camp, especially since the roads being blocked by the sheriffs in the first place, just causing this traffic. So that's where we're at right now. Still the same situation by the by the entrance to the Line three camp, walking back to the Toe t Uck.
That seems a little more tense at the moment. There are there are I mean when when when we first heard about this in the Earth First camp, they said there was like one sheriff's deputy here trying to block the entrance to the camp um with his vehicle. And since we've arrived, there is like probably twenty at least twenty sriff deputies here, possibly more. This is like at least like fifteen fifteen sheriff's vehicles, so definitely a larger
presence than at the beginning of the day. As the day continued on and everyone got more antsy arrests and state violence seemed less like a possibility and more of an inevitability. Looks like they just got a call for a jail van um from the sheriff's comms radio. There is there's a lot of people here. Um, there's a lot of people here. So if they want to rest everyone whom we might need multiple vans um. But yeah,
that is the state of this. I'm I'm up at the front by the entrance to the camp, there's like three different Sheriff's vehicles UM blocking the roadway UM and a line of like ten or so vehicles from the Earth First camp trying to bring supplies hip. Tis that coming out? And I just got told zip ties are coming out. None of the sheriff's deputies wanted to say much well being recorded, but they did recommend if anyone had any questions. They asked County Sheriff Corey A. Yukes.
When asked how one would get in contact with Sheriff at Yukes, A deputy replied, when most of these people go to jail, a little good an opportunity to speak with him. Under more pressure, the deputy clarified that the reason they plan to arrest and charge people public nuisance
and obstruction of a roadway. They talked like they were very concerned that they were cars parked illegally and that the roadway was blocked and obstructed, conveniently ignoring the fact that at this point the only vehicles blocking the whole road were Sheriff's cars and trucks, and that said sheriffess vehicles blocking the road was the reason the caravan of
support cars were pulled over to the side. It looks like there are big like patty wagons, big big vans to put people who are rested in on each side of this road now, um, and people are gonna try to avoid this mass mass arrest scenario by trying to go into the line three camp up. I'm guessing on to three or four or five fifteen vehicles probably get towed. Um. Again, the sheriff's the sheriff vehicles are the one blocking the road right now. Everyone else is just everyone is just
parked on the side at the moment. Um, I'm gonna slowly kind of make my way into the into the area that's slightly safer so I can continue reporting. Um. So I am going to be moving in shortly. The I was told how do you get I was told the sheriff, Um, like, you know, head sheriff man is going to be here and we can maybe talk talk to him. But he is not here at the moment that I know of. Yeah, there's a patty wagon, all right, Yeah,
they definitely got a They've definitely got a fucking wagon out. Um. They're absolutely gonna try to rest so many people as possible. Since it became obvious that all of the caravan cars were gonna be towed. Some folks decided that they weren't gonna make it super easy. We have some people who decided to park their cars perpendicular on the road, some sideways so they're more difficult to tow. Um, we'll see what I'm guessing. The law enforcement reaction to this is
not gonna They're not gonna be pleased. Already blocked people are as expected. The comps weren't thrilled with the cars now being parked sideways on the road. The detective on the scene said, so, not only are all these cars gonna get towed at this point in time, I'm going to site every owner of the vehicle. And then this happened about twenty minutes ago. Have thirty minutes ago Sheriff's officer U s Starch deputy took someone by d um and they have not given it back up. And it
looks like that person has since been arrested. They're getting dragged away. Yeah, someone someone's been dragged away. It looks like we have the first arrest. What didn't take long for things to escalate, and a line of Sheriff's in sparse riot gear to form a line to oppose the stop Lane three and Earth First campers did some lewd chanting. After the chanting stopped, the riot line slowly pushed forward,
forcing people into the driveway. So UM the line of Sheriff's deputies uh she dispersal order on the side of the road near the entrance UM to the camp. The very rough right line was everyone equipped with Exeptize chaser's guns however spray etcetera. UM, some habitans or big clubs dispelling clubs. UM. They moved towards the road. It looks like all of the Line three protesters have moved into like the UM driveway of the camp that's currently being
blocked by the Sheriff's vehicles. UM. So that's where that's where most people are right now. There are some other UM people here to that came to support and deliver supplies. Also the people who live here at the camp on the on the other side of the main road, UM, the one where the top truck is currently next to next to like the main drag that got us. They got us to the side road which gets us into the road near the camp. There's there's a dozen or
so maybe like two dozen sheriffs on that side as well. UM, a couple of dozen um campers and people that came for supplies and uh. One of the one of the sheriffs and a detective said that they're dealing with this. They said, fitting with this situation, referring to the stuff near the entrance first, and then they will deal with the dozen or so vehicles that have pulled off onto the road. Um after being blocked by the sheriff's cars. UM. So we're taking this kind of one step at the
time here. Unclear how many more rests still be there's already been one. UM, just kind of waiting it out at the moment. One one guy keeps insisting that if everyone moves into the camp, UM, there won't be any arrests. Of course, they already arrested somebody who cops also took took three d never gave it back for like an hour. UM. So that's that is the thing we're dealing with at
the moment. Another toe truck arrived on the other side of the road, closer to the new wage Camp entrance and began towing vehicles from this side too, albeit with a rough start. Don't truck the struggle, and it's it's it's getting pulled back. It's trying to winch the car to change this. Granted, ran the toad strugge not it'll go, but it's gonna. It's gonna do this. Follow their orders. You don't need to tow this van. They're blocking our driveway.
We need to want to drive the van into the driveway. You don't need to tow it. About four minutes in it looks like they missed the rant. It's been five minutes. They'll get it this next As the tow truck was struggling, the sheriffs were struggling to get people to move further down the driveway spurs thirty three feet. You're still in it. It goes for all of you thirty three feet. Definitely further yet okay, just like they're trying to disperse, disperse
means to disperse, can't do so. You will not be the charge. Were arrested who with the crime of public juice. It's violation and the awful assembly. That's what dispersed means almost dated thing. You're still trying to get the first man they might do at this time. Oh maybe it's a way. I don't know, quite a bit of damage to vot. You have the character entires almost nine minutes in almost add eleven minutes into them trying to move this span onto I think they'll probably get at this time,
but they may public tire. This is thrilling Audio content and the Toucher company are doing quite a bit of damage to the to the public road, which is of course I run in because they're here claiming is still happening because of the cards walking the road. Those are the cars walking um but still threatening arrests for like pup muise and stuff. I mean, the froad is gonna get so messed up by the time they to the
rest of like the fifteen cars. It's taken like fifteen minutes to get the bat other one might get the faster. There's quite a bit of damage about right, oh ship. It looks like the toe truck they have just the coach are it looks at the toe truck they have just got some of the metal in the bottom got worked or snapped us. Yeah, yea that they can't be
good since it's run it's still working. Damn. There's a lot of what do you think they took that so first been sixteen minutes, so that's sixteen times to get straight. Well they got up only I don't know fifteen more ago. Shortly after the problematic van was towed, comps grabbed more folks just arrested about four people who were walking towards the exit of the road carrying blankets chanting waters life um.
And then as the crowd was missed, the crowd who was you know, gathered to watch as the as the police they tackle and arrest of them. One person was filming and uh like another like a protest per camper um was filming and police grabbed them off the road and put them into handcuffs. So another arrested. There the rough riot line of Sheriff's and now also Park Rapids police did a surprise charge into the driveway, tackling and
arresting five people for no apparent reason. Hurting people after the abrupt attack from the cops, folks from no mawag and earth first from the very strong and tight shield wall on the driveway leading to the private property. Meanwhile, someone up the road locked themselves onto one of the
cars to temporarily prevented from being towed. One of the main detective guys that's been talking to the group the past few hours walked up to the shield wall and said, Um, your friend that's like hooked up to the equipment, UM needs to needs you need we need you to unhook him or we're gonna destroy your car. UM because he's climbing that he doesn't know how to remove the lock
box that's connected to the car. UM crowd said just started chanting cops sly and he walked aways like okay, UM, So my guess is that they probably will destroy the car because like why why wouldn't they right if they're going if they have an excuse to do that, of course they didn't to it. So I'm guessing they're gonna be selling a part of car UM, and then the
person in the lock box is gonna get arrested. Um, they'll probably face some of the harshest charges out of everyone that's been the rest of today so far, I've counted about ten arrests. UM. Yeah, I think spread around ten. Right now. The shield wall has been holding strong for almost almost like an hour and a half At this point,
Um and the Sheriff's haves have not advanced. One of them tried to like trespass into private property like part part of this land and was called out for it and people went over there to film and then he left because he's he's obviously breaking the law. There was to the cabra's um, he looked, he looked very sad. Um. But yeah, now we're still to set the standstill with UM stop Lane three protesters with shields UM trying to hold holding their ground against the Sheriff's who marched into
into the driveway and towards their camp. So that's situation. That's the situation right now. It's almost to eleven pm, standing around for a while. I don't have a right jacket anymore because I believe the I believe it is the car I arrived in. UM, I believe it's probably towed away and I left my raine jacket inside. So I'm not at my regular student spot at this at
the top Line three camp. I don't have a check of I don't have ray jacket, I have some water, and then there's you know people here who are who've been extremely friendly. UM. So yeah, that's that's the update as of ten pm in Hubbard County at the stop to Line three protest on the drive here. I saw all of the all the equipment, um, all of like the line three pipes and stuff laid out in the
giant field. It was a massive there's a lot of a lot of stuff, um, and I know they're just starting to dig under the Mississippi River to put in the line three pipes and stuff. The movement somber when as discussions of the pipeline, UM, yeah, a lot of
it's it's extremely somber. People talking about how this land is extremely important to them and um, their indigenous relatives and the spirits living in the water and in the trees, um, and how the line three of pipes are gonna kill so much of this environment and so much of this history. But these people know that a movement can't run on grief, sorrow and resentment all on its own. That's a people cheering on the people cheering on the person that locked
themselves to one of the vehicles. I believe they just got let let into a into one of the jail vans, um and they they yelled at the crowd from from out on the street, and everyone cheered them on to you know, make them to you know. The camaraderie here is one of the main driving forces the feeling of community. UM. The feeling of you know, putting something at risk, going going into the conflict and knowing that you have a community to support you, UM and cheer you on and
UM help you out and no matter what happens. UM. And that's that's the that's that's the main driving force from all my time at the Earth First conference or gathering. That's you know, one of the main things that gets talked about, maybe not in those words, that the same, that's the same idea, UM is that you know, this isn't a movement of individuals, um. This is it only works as a movement when everyone's together like this and everyone's supporting each other. Almost three hours and to hold
in the shield wall. At around midnight, someone started playing fun the Police on a big speaker and almost on queue. That's when the sheriffs and cops decided to pull out. The crowd erupted in celebration, and then the absence of the cop cars headlights, I could see fireflies in the darkened street for the first time in my life. This wraps up part one of my two Earth First and Stop Line three episodes about my trip to Minnesota. Part two will air tomorrow and wrap up this particular small
section of the stop Line three story. If you want to support the Stop Line three movement and people who are fighting right now, you can go to Protest Law dot org slash line three to donate, and also go to Stop Line three Bail Funds dot org to donate to bail Funds and to donate to the Canoe Collective. You can go to bit dot l y slash stop Pipeline three