Red State Rebels: Idaho Residents Call For Support & Solidarity Against Tar Sands Megaloads

By scott parkin
Last week's blockade in Moscow, ID. Photo via Wild Idaho Rising Tide.

Bam! The fight against the tar sands is hot!

In the past week and a half, over 800 people have been arrested sitting-in at the White House in protest of the Keystone XL pipeline. And yesterday, Indigenous Canadians took action at the Canadian embassy in Washington D.C. More actions are planned everyday until Saturday and it’s beginning to spread around the world with solidarity actions in Cairo and Durban, South Africa.

And in Idaho, Wild Idaho Rising Tide has already taken multiple actions to block the tar sands “megaload” trucks bound for Alberta.

Last week, nine activists were arrested fighting the megaloads. More actions are planned. Sixty-seven more loads will be rolling and they need some help!

Oil companies like Exxon are transporting massive pieces of oil extraction equipment from South Korea to Portland, OR via ship, then sending them up the Snake and Columbia Rivers by barge to Lewiston, ID. The plan is to truck them to Alberta over Idaho and Montana’s scenic highways and byways. The megaloads have been fought in the legal and regulatory arenas in both states. Exxon has used every trick and loophole in the book to move that equipment. Now they are moving and Idaho’s residents are responding with non-violent direct action.

via Wild Idaho Rising Tide

Last night’s attempt at a blockade was foiled as Exxon is now paying the city police department and the Idaho State Police as their own personal security detail. From folks on the ground: “Last night the city of Moscow was a police-state, with close to 30 police officers lining a 3-block radius in downtown. We’ve been tipped off that Exxon put in a phone call to the City police department and is now paying the force’s overtime pay.”

Wild Idaho Rising Tide put out this call for support today:

via WIlid Idaho Rising Tide

Keep up your creativity and resolve under pressure, dear comrades! Allies elsewhere, we are under escalating siege and need you by our sides, either physically or fiscally. Please come to Idaho or contribute your aid to our resistance of another 67 transports that build tar sands hell.

Contact Wild Idaho Rising Tide at wild.idaho.rising.tide@gmail.com or on Facebook.

They need support funds and people to help plan and carry out creative non-violent direct action. Please support however you can.