NEAR THE STANDING ROCK SIOUX RESERVATION, N.D. (AP) — The Latest on the legal challenge and protest of the four-state Dakota Access oil pipeline (all times local):
10:30 a.m.
More than 1,000 people, including families and children, are gathered at the Dakota Access pipeline protest site in North Dakota.
They’re awaiting a critical ruling from a federal judge on the Standing Rock Sioux tribe’s request to block the $3.8 billion pipeline over environmental concerns.
Judith LeBlanc is director of the New York-based Native Organizers Alliance. She said Friday that it’s an historic coming together of tribes — probably the largest such gathering of Native Americans in a century.
People have come from as far as New York and Alaska, as well as Canada.
Kate Silvertooth made the daylong drive from Colorado on Thursday, spending hundreds of dollars on supplies such as tarps and food. She says she “felt moved” to help the protesters.
The pipeline, being built by a Texas-based company, is to carry oil from western North Dakota to Illinois.
9:05 a.m.
The Great Plains Tribal Chairman’s Association has asked U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch to send federal monitors to the site of a large pipeline protest in North Dakota.
The Standing Rock Sioux tribe and others are trying to stop the $3.8 billion Dakota Access pipeline, saying it threatens their drinking water and has disturbed sacred sites.
The association, made up of tribal leaders in the Dakotas and Nebraska, aims to defend tribal rights.
President John Yellow Bird Steele sent a letter to Lynch on Thursday saying protesters have been attacked by private security with guard dogs and that racial profiling is occurring. Authorities say some protesters are armed with hatchets and knives, and Saturday’s protest injured guards and dogs.
Lynch’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
U.S. District Judge James Boasberg says he’ll rule by the end of Friday on the tribe’s challenge to the pipeline, which will carry oil from North Dakota to Illinois.
8 a.m.
Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein says she’s working with North Dakota authorities to arrange a court date on charges related to her participation in a protest against the Dakota Access pipeline.
Stein has acknowledged spray-painting construction equipment Tuesday in North Dakota. Stein and running mate Ajamu Baraka were charged Wednesday with misdemeanor counts of criminal trespass and criminal mischief, and authorities issued arrest warrants.
Stein defended her actions to the Chicago Tribune (http://trib.in/2cfvzAg ) Thursday during a campaign stop in Chicago. She said it would have been “inappropriate for me not to have done my small part” to support the Standing Rock Sioux.
The tribe says the pipeline threatens sacred sites and drinking water.
The $3.8 billion pipeline is to carry oil from western North Dakota to Illinois.
1:27 a.m.
A federal judge is set to deliver a key ruling on the four-state Dakota Access pipeline that has drawn thousands of protesters to a construction site in North Dakota in recent weeks.
U.S. District Judge James Boasberg says he’ll rule by the end of Friday on the Standing Rock Sioux tribe’s request to block the $3.8 billion project, which will carry oil from North Dakota to Illinois.
The tribe argues the project threatens water supplies and has already disrupted sacred sites. The developer, Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners, says modern technology allows quick detection of leaks. Pipeline supporters also say it would cut the amount of oil that travels by train.
A weekend confrontation between protesters and private security guards left some guards injured and some protesters with dog bites.
This item has been corrected for style to make “pipeline” lowercase in all instances.
First Published: September 9, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
Updated: September 9, 2016, 3:33 p.m.
