Thursday, 01/25/2024, on American Indian Airwaves 

“Defiling Mother Earth: Stopping the Mountain Valley Pipeline”

Today on American Indian Airwaves listeners will hear an update the $6.6 billion Mountain Valley Pipeline construction struggles and how the Mountain Valley Pipeline, LLC, a joint venture of several companies operating in the extractive industries, could desecrate Native American sacred and cultural sites with the planned construction of the Southgate portion of the Mountain Valley Pipeline into what is called the state of North Carolina. Meanwhile, listeners will be informed about the how the Mountain Valley Pipeline LLC. is presenting suing over 40 land defenders, and two organizations (Appalachians Against Pipelines and Rising Tide North America) with Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (S.L.A.P.P.) lawsuits. 

SLAPP lawsuits are often instigated by wealthy corporations and sometimes the state. It is powerful legal tactic used to silence and censor Native Americans, U.S. citizens, grassroots peoples, activists, and even organizations. SLAPP lawsuits result in violating peoples U.S. Constitutionally protected Free Speech rights and their right to assemble while the lawsuits move through the court system. Moreover, SLAPP lawsuits are financially expensive for Native Americans, U.S. citizens, activist, land defenders, water protectors, and grassroots and non-profit organizations, that result is systemic financial harms. 

The Mountain Valley Pipeline, LLC is a joint venture of Equitrans Midstream, NextEra Energy Resources, Consolidated Edison, and RGC Resources, and other companies. The pipeline is six years behind schedule, about half a billion dollars over budget, and, despite promises that it would be done by the end of last year, delayed once again. The remaining construction is over rugged terrain, with hundreds of water crossings left to bridge. The pipeline runs through the states of West Virgina, south Virgina, and possibly into North Carolina, including through and adjacent to mostly Native American communities, POC neighborhoods, and poorer white communities. Beside the land and water damages, if the pipeline is fully constructed, the long-term, irreversible danger is releasing 90 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere from producing, transporting, and burning all that methane over the 40 to 50 years the pipeline’s life expectancy. 

Tune in to hear more about the struggle over the Mountain Valley Pipeline, the U.S Congress political back deals and the U.S. Supreme Court’s complicity in sanctioning the original pipeline route’s contrition, and what listeners can do to defend the sacred. 

Guest:
Dr. Crystal Cavalier-Keck, member of the Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation, co-founder of Seven Directions of Service, and chair of the NAACP Environmental Justice Committee.

Archived programs can be heard on Soundcloud at: https://soundcloud.com/burntswamp

American Indian Airwaves streams on over ten podcasting platforms such as Amazon Music, Apple Podcast, Audible, Backtracks.fm, Gaana, Google Podcast, Fyyd, iHeart Media, Mixcloud, Player.fm, Podbay.fm, Podcast Republic, SoundCloud, Spotify, Tunein, YouTube, and more.

Defiling Mother Earth: Stopping the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP)

American Indian Airwaves (AIA), an Indigenous public affairs radio porgram and, perhaps, the longest running Native American radio program within both Indigenous and the United States broadcast communication histories. Also, AIA broadcast weekly every Thursday from 7pm to 8pm (PCT) on KPFK FM 90.7 Los Angeles (http://www.kpfk.org).  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aiacr


American Indian Airwaves is produced in Burntswamp Studios and started broadcasting on March 1st, 1973 on KPFK in order to give Indigenous peoples and their respective First Nations a voice about the continuous struggles against Settler Colonialism and imperialism by the occupying and settler societies often referred to as the United States, Canada, Mexico, and the Latin and South America countries located therein.

American Indian Airwaves operates as an all-volunteer collective with no corporate sponsorship and no underwriters.