UCI rally joins protests against Dakota oil pipeline
Though protests near the planned route of the Dakota Access Pipeline have been going on more than 1,500 miles from UC Irvine, about 120 activists, faculty members and students on the campus Tuesday rallied to show support for the demonstrators.
The peaceful rally near the UCI flagpoles featured the university’s humanities dean, Georges Van Den Abbeele, and speakers representing UCI student government, the University Council-American Federation of Teachers Local 2226, the United Auto Workers for graduate students and the American Indian Student Assn. at UCI.
Van Den Abbeele opened the event by calling the demonstrations against the oil pipeline a “protest on behalf of the Earth.”
The $3.7-billion Dakota Access Pipeline project would place a 30-inch-diameter pipe over 1,172 miles from Stanley, N.D., to Patoka, Ill., to carry domestic light sweet crude oil to major refining markets. It is intended to transport about 470,000 barrels per day across four states, according to developer Energy Access Partners.
However, opponents argue it would pass near important Native American sites and potentially harm the environment.
Protesters in North Dakota have said the pipeline will threaten the land near the Standing Rock Indian Reservation.
The Standing Rock Sioux tribe says the pipeline, part of which would run under the Missouri River, could affect the tribe’s drinking water supply and put communities downstream at risk of contamination from crude oil leaks and spills.
“The protection of the water would mean that we finally have won a little bit of our battle against the oppressors who have been trying to kill off our people for the last 500 years,” Chelsea Baloo, a member of UCI’s American Indian Student Assn., said at the campus rally Tuesday. “We’re definitely glad that people are finally listening to our voices.”
More than 400 people protesting the pipeline in North Dakota clashed with police Sunday on a bridge north of a protest camp near the Standing Rock reservation. Tear gas, rubber bullets and a water cannon were used on protesters Sunday night.
Van Den Abbeele and other speakers encouraged those at the UCI rally to learn how to organize demonstrations peacefully and to protect their right to assembly and free speech.
Some people held signs with messages such as “Fight for people and planet over profit” and “We stand with Standing Rock.”
The rally came together after Ben Garceau, a lecturer in the UCI School of Humanities, returned this month from a four-day trip to Standing Rock, where he said he saw people being pepper-sprayed and doused with water in freezing weather.
Garceau said he helped organize the rally with the University Council-American Federation of Teachers local and UCI’s American Indian Resource Program, which offers support services for tribal students.
Petition seeks sanctuary campus
Many UCI staff, faculty and alumni have signed an online petition seeking to make the institution a sanctuary campus to help protect undocumented students.
As of Monday morning, the petition had 966 signatures.
The action is part of a trend in which petitions and protests at universities nationwide are calling for the schools to become sanctuary campuses in response to President-elect Donald Trump’s pledge to deport millions of undocumented immigrants.
Columbia University Provost John Coatsworth described in an email Monday the New York institution’s plan to withhold undocumented students’ information from immigration officials without a subpoena, prevent immigration officials from entering the campus without a warrant and provide more financial aid for such students if Trump decides to repeal a federal law that shields undocumented students from deportation.
A statement Tuesday from UCI spokeswoman Cathy Lawhon said her university’s “policies and commitments ... are clear and unchanged. The UCIPD [Police Department] does not detain, question or arrest individuals solely because they lack documentation. While it is too soon to speculate on any potential changes in national policy, we will carefully monitor this issue and remain steadfast in our support of students and their right to privacy.”
