Tar Sands Blockade Fights Keystone XL Pipeline

EAST TEXAS — The Tar Sands Blockade continues to shut down construction sites along the Keystone XL Pipeline route in Texas. The blockade describes itself as a coalition of Texas and Oklahoma landowners using civil disobedience to shut down construction along the route. Group organizer Ron Seifert says they have been chaining themselves to the construction equipment. Seifert says, “It’s a threat to our Constitutional property rights; it’s a threat to our neighbors’ health, safety, and security; and it’s simply untested. We have no idea how tar sands can be safely commuted through a pipeline system.” They shut down construction in Saltillo, Texas, on Wednesday, and they plan to continue, as Seifert put it, “as long as it takes.” Plans call for the pipeline to run through much of East Texas on its way to Gulf-area refineries.