Dallas (WBAP/KLIF News) – The US Army Corps of Engineers has ordered a stop to the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline, which would bring oil from the Bakken Shale in the Dakotas to Illinois, where it could then be shipped to refineries.
Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners is building the pipeline. The company had planned to finish the line by the end of this year, but the Corps of Engineers has ordered a stop to construction under a reservoir in the Missouri River.
The Corps says the order will allow time to “explore alternate routes.”
Thousands of Native Americans have protested construction in North Dakota and outside Energy Transfer Partners’ headquarters in Dallas.
“This is something that the entire United States needs to be aware of,” says the Lakota Tribe’s Yolanda Bluehorse, who had organized several protests in Dallas. “Take, for instance, Flint Michigan, they’re still dealing with contaminated drinking water.”
Energy Transfer Partners says it has “done nothing but play by the rules.”
“The White House’s directive to the Corps for further delay is just the latest in a series of overt and transparent political actions by an administration which has abandoned the rule of law in favor of currying favor with a narrow and extreme political constituency,” Energy Transfer Partners wrote in a statement.
Last week, Donald Trump voiced support for the pipeline, saying the line would “benefit all Americans.”
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