12,000 strong. That's how many people showed up Sunday, November 6 -- exactly one year before Election Day 2012 -- to link arms around the White House in a circle of hope (three rings deep!) and urge President Obama to stop the proposed Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline. As the sun set over Lafayette Park, President Obama's motorcade was met with a deafening chorus of “Yes you can stop the pipeline.”
Evidence is mounting that the State Department's review of a proposed tar sands oil pipeline has been corrupted by bias, lobbyist influence and conflicts of interest. The growing scandal is making front-page headlines and putting new pressure on President Obama to stop the pipeline.
October 14, 2011: Our communications director has compiled a must-read list of coverage of the Keystone XL pipeline controversy. There’s been a lot of coverage. He's compiled some of the last week’s key stories here.
The tangled web of corruption surrounding the Keystone XL pipeline implicates lobbyists and government officials alike. DeSmogBlog, Oil Change International, The Other 98% and Friends of the Earth investigated the cozy relationships between key State Department officials and corporate lobbyists, and they lead all the way to the president’s doorstep.
President Obama made a campaign promise to shut out oil lobbyists, yet the State Department’s blatant bias toward approving the Keystone XL pipeline is a…
October 5, 2011
Since there’s been so much news related to the Keystone XL pipeline controversy subsequent to our release of the second round of State Department documents, we put together the following news roundup.
Breaking this a.m.: State Department sued to force halt to ongoing illegal pipeline constructionhttp://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/05/usa-keystone-suit-idUSN1E7940FS20111005
WASHINGTON Oct 5 (Reuters) - Environmental groups sued the U.S. government on Wednesday to stop the clearing of grasslands, the moving of threatened…
With the release of the second batch of documents, the filing of a lawsuit to stop illegal pipeline construction work in Nebraska and the expansion of our Freedom of Information Act request, there has been extensive media coverage of the pro-pipeline bias and oil industry complicity within the State Department. Highlights of coverage of the influence scandal and of the broader fight to stop Keystone XL can be found below.
November 16, 2011
Mother…
Friends of the Earth and allies have obtained internal emails from the State Department that provide definitive evidence of bias and complicity in the department's review of the proposed Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline.
The emails are a key part of a growing influence scandal in which the review has become corrupted by bias, lobbyist influence and conflicts of interest.
Thus far, we have received two rounds of documents from the State Department in…
We have obtained documents from the State Department in response to our Freedom of Information Act request that provide evidence of agency bias and indicate the State Department was doing favors for TransCanada during the Keystone XL review.
With joy and resolve, I was arrested for the first time on August 29. I joined more than 1,200 people who stubbornly planted their bodies on President Obama’s doorstep across two weeks of rolling sit-ins because I am fed up, but I have not given up.
A new report, Dirty Business: How TransCanada Pipelines bullies farmers, manipulates oil markets, threatens fresh water and skimps on safety in the United States, examines the tactics and motivations of TransCanada Pipelines, one of the continent’s largest pipeline companies, as it pushes for approval of its proposed mega-project, the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline.