11/25/24

Today's intersection: the Corps, the courts and property rights under Trump's Project 2025

During President Barack Obama's tenure the US Department of Transportation swatted ExxonMobil with a million dollar penalty after the Environmental Protection Agency released an overview of cleanup efforts in the aftermath of the 2011 breach of the Silvertip pipeline that spilled 63,000 gallons of crude oil into the Yellowstone River upstream of Billings near Laurel, Montana

Summit Carbon Solutions wants to dig a ditch for a $4.5 billion pipeline vulnerable to rupture and rip up over two thousand miles of unceded tribal lands where thousands of Indigenous Americans are buried then pump carbon dioxide to some sacrifice zone in occupied North Dakota ostensibly to be sequestered. But, Republicans are militantly divided over the utility of eminent domain for private enterprise for pipelines moving carbon dioxide and building solar and wind farms but are just fine with employing it for the entrepreneurial transport of oil and gas. 

Interior Secretary nominee, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum champions the CO2 pipeline project that aligns with President Joe Biden’s push for the Green New Deal. Yet, until the Trump Organization seizes absolute power any pipeline required Army Corps of Engineers permits for water body crossings and those usually require environmental reviews that heavily involve the Interior Department. But at post time federal agencies are refusing to meet with Trump nominees to begin transition until he signs the standard ethics and transparency pledges required by every incoming president. 

In the ag portion of the Project 2025 text is an outline for unlimited corporate access to public lands and national forests despite a timber glut and sawmill closures so expect corporations with access to mineral rights run roughshod over landowners. So, it looks like Republican Earth haters who voted for a convicted felon and rapist for POTUS could see their property rights just go away.
The Iowa Supreme Court on Friday sided with Summit Carbon Solutions in an appeal filed by a Hardin County landowner who has fought the company from gaining access to his property to conduct a survey ahead of the construction of a carbon pipeline. The South Dakota Supreme Court recently ruled that surveys or examinations of property that included more than minimal soil disturbance were not allowed. [Iowa Supreme Court Sides With Summit]
Yes, the EPA and US Fish and Wildlife Service are within the Executive Branch and as Commander in Chief the president could simply order the Corps and all to stand down with or without involving an activist Supreme Court of the United States dooming private property rights to utilities that aren't your friends.

After the Trumpians take power and begin to break things, when everyday people start to notice disruptions and negative impacts, will the propaganda machines ensure that the blame is placed not on the current admin, but on liberals and leftists, trans people and immigrants, academics and activists?

— Kate Starbird (@katestarbird.bsky.social) November 24, 2024 at 5:00 PM

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