rich 1.0 Action Network https://actionnetwork.org <link href='https://actionnetwork.org/css/style-embed-v3.css' rel='stylesheet' type='text/css' /><script src='https://actionnetwork.org/widgets/v6/letter/stop-the-line-5-pipeline2?format=js&source=widget'></script><div id='can-letter-area-stop-the-line-5-pipeline2' style='width: 100%'><!-- this div is the target for our HTML insertion --></div> Native Organizers Alliance Action Fund https://actionnetwork.org/groups/native-organizers-alliance https://can2-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/groups/default_facebook_images/000/022/886/original/NOA_ActionFundBanner2.png?1668645803 Michigan Tribes are fighting to stop the ‘Line 5’ pipeline that would run under the Straits of Mackinac, to protect their Treaty fishing rights, and to prevent escalation of the global climate crisis. The Treaty was signed in 1836, the year before Michigan was recognized as a state. Now, the Michigan Public Service Commission (MPSC) has granted Enbridge Energy a permit to build the pipeline. The last step preventing construction on the project is a federal permit following an assessment and Environmental Impact Statement by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (ACE). Whitney Gravelle, President of the Bay Mills Indian Community which has led the legal fight for years, said, “[The Commission’s] decision is another notch in a long history of ignoring the rights of tribal nations. We must act now to protect the peoples of the Great Lakes from an oil spill, to lead our communities out of the fossil fuel era, and to preserve the shared lands and waters in Michigan for all of us.” All of Michigan’s 12 Tribal Nations oppose the pipeline, including the five Tribes of the Chippewa Ottawa Resource Authority (CORA): the Bay Mills Indian Community, Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, Little River Band of Ottawa Indians, Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians and Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians. It is our sovereign right, codified and guaranteed to the CORA Tribes by the 1836 Treaty, to fish and protect the fish habitats in the Upper Great Lakes. In addition, the MPSC had received over 23,000 comments opposing the project prior to granting Enbridge the contract anyway. Enbridge already has a track record of burst pipelines. In one of the worst inland oil spills in the U.S., part of the Line 6B pipeline dumped more than 840,000 gallons of oil into the headwaters of the Kalamazoo River. The risks for Mother Earth are not just from oil spills. The increase in oil production represented by the proposed pipeline will worsen the climate crisis. The Stockholm Environment Institute estimates the newly proposed pipeline would result in the release of 27 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the air every year. Building the pipeline would delay Michigan’s transition away from fossil fuels, as required by recent legislation signed by Governor Gretchen Whitmer, mandating the state transition to 100 percent clean energy by 2040. Jannan J. Cornstalk, citizen of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians, emphasizes the cultural and spiritual importance of protecting the waters of the Great Lakes, saying, “Our very lifeways and cultures hang in the balance... The disturbances go deeper than you are hearing. That water is our relative, and we will do whatever it takes to protect our water, our sacred relative.” Our last line of defense is the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. They can still stop the project by denying the federal permit for the Line 5 pipeline. Click ‘Start Writing’ to sign and send a direct message to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers demanding respect for the treaty rights of Indigenous peoples and deny the federal permit needed to authorize Line 5 now. https://actionnetwork.org/letters/stop-the-line-5-pipeline2