Rally/Action To Support Amy Goodman and other courageous journalists At Standing Rock

Rally Action To Support Amy Goodman and other courageous journalists At Standing Rock

ACTION ALERT: Tues., 10/18, 4PM PT @ KPFA, Support Amy Goodman and other courageous journalists

As most of you probably know, the State of North Dakota issued an arrest warrant for Amy Goodman covering the Dakota Access Pipeline protest on September 3. By the time you get this she may have turned herself in to the Morton County court in ND today at 1:30pm CT.

Amy Goodman’s live coverage of the Dakota Access Pipeline has been extraordinary and courageous. Democracy Now! airs on Pacifica stations. See the motion (below) passed by the KPFK Local Station Board today. KPFK is LA’s Pacifica sister station of KPFA.

Let's support Amy as well as our local KPFA Pacifica station journalists, photo journalists and live streamers and all those around the country and world for their coverage of so many sensitive issues.

Join others to voice your support for Amy and all courageous journalists who speak/write the truth

Date: Tuesday, October 18, 2016
Time: 4:00 PM PT
Where: In front of the KPFA station (1929 Martin Luther King, Jr. Way, Berkeley, CA 94704)
For more information, contact: Steve Zeltzer, KPFA Pacifica WorkWeek, workweek [at] kpfa.org 415-282-1908


MOTION OPPOSING THE ARREST OF JOURNALISTS COVERING THE PROTESTS TO THE DAKOTA ACCESS PIPELINE

Amy Goodman, Deia Schlosberg, and Shailene Woodley are among the journalists who have been arrested while covering demonstrations against the Dakota Access Pipeline.

The Arrest of Journalists and Filmmakers Covering the Dakota Pipeline Is a violation of the First Amendment, the Constitution, is a threat to the media, Democracy—and the Planet.

Therefore the KPFK LSB goes on record opposing such arrests and in support of journalists who have been arrested in Dakota and North Dakota, and call on the prosecutors of said cases to immediately drop said charges. Furthermore we call upon the arresting authorities to cease the harrassment and and seizure of materials and film of journalists covering the Dakota Access Pipeline protests.

The Arrest of Journalists and Filmmakers Covering the Dakota Pipeline Is a Threat to Democracy—and the Planet
Deia Schlosberg, Amy Goodman, and Shailene Woodley are among those who have been arrested while covering demonstrations against the Dakota Access Pipeline.
https://www.thenation.com/article/the-arrest-of-journalists-and-filmmakers-covering-the-dakota-pipeline-is-a-threat-to-democracy-and-the-planet/
By Josh FoxTwitterYESTERDAY 4:06 PM



Shailene Woodley was arrested while broadcasting a protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline on October 11, 2016. (Morton County Sheriff's Department)

On October 11, Deia Schlosberg, the producer of my new film, How to Let Go of the World and Love All the Things Climate Can’t Change, was arrested in Walhalla, North Dakota, while reporting on a climate-change protest. She was held for 48 hours before being allowed to speak to a lawyer. The authorities confiscated her footage. She is now charged with three counts of felony conspiracy and faces a possible sentence of up to 45 years.

For being a journalist.

The First Amendment and the Constitution are at stake in this case. If we lose it, we lose America too.
Deia isn’t alone. The arrest of journalists, filmmakers, and others witnessing and reporting on citizen protests against fossil-fuel infrastructure amid climate change is part of a worrisome and growing pattern. Last month in North Dakota, a warrant was issued to arrest Amy Goodman, award-winning host of Democracy Now!, after she covered Native American–led protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline. Her footage of security guards attacking peaceful protesters with bloody-snouted dogs was viewed over 14 million times. She elected to go back to North Dakota this week to face the charges. Actor Shailene Woodley was arrested and jailed this week while leaving a protest at a construction site for the Dakota Access Pipeline. She was singled out, the police told her, because she was well-known and had 40,000 people watching live on her Facebook page. Other filmmakers shooting protest actions along the pipeline have also been arrested.

All this should send chills down the spine of every documentary filmmaker and journalist.

Although the national media paid little attention to the climate-change protest that Deia and others attempted to report on, it was remarkable. A small group of activists in four states shut down all the pipelines carrying tar-sands oil from Alberta, Canada, into the United States. The protest responded to a call from the Standing Rock Sioux for international prayer and action on the growing climate emergency. Activists shut off emergency valves along the pipeline, their message being, “We are in a climate emergency now.”

If it were up to the mainstream media we wouldn’t know about this. I know, because I broke the story of fracking. It had been a crisis for years, but the media were ignoring it, which is why I decided to make my film Gasland.

As a relative newcomer to documentary filmmaking I am in awe of the bravery of documentarians. Doc filmmakers often break important stories and risk their lives and safety doing it. Laura Poitras’s reporting on Edward Snowden in Citizen Four, ‎Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Act of Killing, Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington’s Restrepo, Alexandria Bombach’s Frame by Frame are just a few examples.


Deia Schlosberg at the 35th College Television Awards (Danny Moloshok / Invision)
Deia’s brave reporting on oil contamination in the Amazon and on fracking and tar sands falls in that category. But how she and others reporting on these issues have been treated by the media and law enforcement shows that the oil-and-gas industry is contaminating them, too. Our government has also been fracked, and is serving fossil-fuel interests. Asked about the pipeline protests this week, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest sounded an ominous warning: “I can tell you that both the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Transportation are investigating these reports and trying to get to the bottom of what exactly happened and what potential steps could be taken to ensure the safety and security of our energy infrastructure.”

I’ve got some news for Barack Obama and his administration. It’s our current energy infrastructure and the fossil-fuel interests that profit from it that are threatening the safety and security of our country. They are the ones continuing to develop new sources of tar sands oil, one the most greenhouse gas–intensive fossil fuels, in the middle of a climate crisis. The implications are dizzying. If we continue to allow the fossil-fuel industry to ship millions of gallon of tar sands oil across our border, we will rocket past any safe level of global warming. We will plunge our major cities underwater. The American Petroleum Institute is calling activists trying to prevent this “extremists.” But the extremists, as Bill McKibben likes to say, work at the oil companies.

Documentary journalism can show the activists ‎as what they really are: sympathetic human beings who are doing something necessary and vital, real people who are sacrificing real freedom to stop the oil-industry extremists before it is too late. In fact, doc filmmaking may be the only thing that can do that. That is why I’ve written a letter calling on members of the media, Governor of North Dakota Jack Dalrymple, United States Attorney for the District of North Dakota Chris Myers, and President Obama to stand up for press freedom and independent journalism on climate change, and call for all charges to be dropped against Deia. This is not only about reporting on the climate-change movement. Journalists have also been arrested reporting on Black Lives Matter, the movement for Native rights, and many other important movements the corporate media fails to cover. The First Amendment and the Constitution are at stake in this case. If we lose it, we lose America too.

You can sign on to our letter of support for Deia at our Web site: http://www.howtoletgomovie.com

DN Journalist Amy Goodman to Turn Herself in to North Dakota Authorities
http://www.democracynow.org/2016/10/13/media_advisory_journalist_amy_goodman_to
OCTOBER 13, 2016

October 13, 2016 – Award-winning journalist Amy Goodman, charged with criminal trespassing for filming an attack on Native American-led pipeline protesters, will turn herself in to North Dakota authorities on October 17.

Amy Goodman will surrender to authorities at the Morton County–Mandan Combined Law Enforcement and Corrections Center at 8:15 a.m. local time (CDT).



"I will go back to North Dakota to fight this charge. It is a clear violation of the First Amendment," said Goodman. "I was doing my job as a journalist, covering a violent attack on Native American protesters."

The charge in State of North Dakota v. Amy Goodman stems from Democracy Now!’s coverage of the protests against the Dakota Access pipeline. On Saturday, September 3, Democracy Now! filmed security guards working for the pipeline company attacking protesters. The report showed guards unleashing dogs and using pepper spray and featured people with bite injuries and a dog with blood on its mouth and nose.

Democracy Now!’s report went viral online, was viewed more than 14 million times on Facebook and was rebroadcast on many outlets, including CBS, NBC, NPR, CNN, MSNBCand the Huffington Post.

On September 8, a criminal complaint and warrant was issued for Goodman’s arrest.

Ironically, in the state’s criminal complaint, North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation Special Agent Lindsey Wohl, referencing the Democracy Now! video report in a sworn affidavit, stated, "Amy Goodman can be seen on the video identifying herself and interviewing protesters about their involvement in the protest." This is precisely the point: Goodman was doing the constitutionally protected work of a reporter.

The pipeline project has faced months of resistance from the Standing Rock Sioux tribe and members of over 200 other tribes from across the U.S., Canada and Latin America.

The Committee to Protect Journalists has said that the warrant is "a transparent attempt to intimidate reporters from covering protests of significant public interest." Steve Andrist, executive director of the North Dakota Newspaper Association, told The Bismarck Tribune, "It’s regrettable that authorities chose to charge a reporter who was just doing her job."

Goodman is the host and executive producer of Democracy Now!, a national, daily, independent, award-winning public television/radio news program that airs on over 1,400 stations worldwide. Goodman has co-authored six New York Times bestsellers and won many of journalism’s highest awards in her more than three decades working as a reporter.

Democracy Now!’s coverage of the pipeline and the protests is available here.

Press Statement:
Time: 8:00 a.m. CDT, Monday October 17, 2016
Place: 211 2nd Ave NW, Mandan ND 58554

Followed by short walk to jail:
Time: 8:15 a.m. CDT Monday October 17, 2016
Place: 205 1st Ave NW, Mandan, ND 58554

For more information, contact Denis Moynihan at +1-646-217-7231 (on-site cell) or media [at] democracynow.org.

Live camera position/uplink available.
To book contact Denis Moynihan.

Press availability will follow Amy Goodman’s arraignment, expected (but not guaranteed) to be several hours after 8:15 a.m. Goodman will be available for TV interviews via live TV camera position.

Live camera positions with satellite uplink connection available onsite to interview Amy Goodman or for use by your correspondent.

Broadcast/print quality video and still photos of Amy Goodman entering Morton County Jail will be available at democracynow.org or by emailing request to media [at] democracynow.org.

Labor Mobilization In Support Of Standing Rock, First Nations, In Opposition To The Dakota Access Pipeline

"We at Oceti Sakowin Camp welcome any and all support from our Union brothers and sisters. This camp stands to protect our sacred water and support a new energy paradigm, jobs and work in green energy fields. We welcome your support in any ways you feel appropriate, join us in paving a new road to a sustainable future for many future generations." --Message from Standing Rock Council to Labor for Standing Rock, 10/13/26.

In response to calls from Standing Rock, please join a coordinated labor mobilization on the weekend of October 29-30!

Further information is below.

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The First Nation’s courageous fight taking place against the Dakota Access Pipeline has ignited a world’s attention. This struggle has become most focused at the water protector’s camp located within the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. It contrasts an inherently dangerous project of the fossil fuel industry with the protection of the local and global environment, Native American sovereignty, and the necessity of a sustainable world.

For our sisters and brothers within the unions and the entire working class, the conflict becomes one of dangerous, fleeting employment that will inevitably destroy our planet, and the possibility of full employment to build safe energy and prosperity for all.

With this is mind we recognize that the recent resolution of the AFL-CIO leadership in support of the Dakota Access pipeline is inherently misguided, and in conflict with First Nations, our common environment, and the interests of people worldwide. In addition, the use of force against the people at Standing Rock mirrors the very attacks we have endured through our own history of building our unions.

At the same time, solidarity with Standing Rock has been voiced by growing number of labor bodies, including:

•Amalgamated Transit Union

•American Federation of Teachers Local 2121 -- City College of San Francisco Faculty Union

•Border Agricultural Workers

•California Faculty Association

•Communications Workers of America

•Industrial Workers of the World

•IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus

•Labor Coalition for Community Action (A. Phillip Randolph Institute, the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, the Coalition of Labor Union Women, the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, and Pride at Work)

•Labor for Palestine

•National Nurses United

•New York State Nurses Association

•National Writers Union/UAW Local 1981

•Service Employees International Union

•United Electrical Workers

•SEIU 503 OPEU

To escalate this growing solidarity, we call on workers everywhere join us for actions on the weekend of October 29-30, 2016, including the following activities:

At Standing Rock:

• Assemble at Standing Rock camp for a labor procession and entrance Saturday, October 22, 10am

• Mid-day lunch gathering to share information on the status and location of pipeline work

• Afternoon actions (picket lines, flyering of pipeline workers etc.)

• Rally back to Standing Rock camp Saturday night for music, discussion, and cultural exchange

• Sunday, October 23 – Possible morning actions, people depart during the day to make it home for Monday work

Elsewhere:

• Post individual or group solidarity selfies of picket signs with labor affiliation, location, and common tagline: #LaborForStandingRock

• Hold local labor solidarity events

With the future of the environment, the rights of First Nations, and the health of the working class at stake, these subsequent actions will help regenerate a labor movement based on the vision of a just, sustainable, and prosperous world for all.

Please join us.

#LaborForStandingRock
#StandWithStandingRock
#No DAPL
#MniWiconi
#SolidarityForever
#greenuninonism