Congresswomen urge Biden to stop pipeline in Minnesota visit

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Minnesota U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar and her progressive congressional allies urged President Joe Biden on Friday to stop construction on Enbridge Energy's Line 3 replacement, even as the project nears completion and the options to stop it dwindle.

Omar was joined by U.S. Reps. Rashida Tlaib, of Michigan, Cori Bush, of Missouri, and Ayanna Pressley, of Massachusetts, and Minnesota state Sen. Mary Kunesh, at a news conference in Minneapolis. The Democratic women called on Biden to revoke a federal water quality permit and stop the project, as the president did with the Keystone XL pipeline the day he took office.

Ahead of a planned weekend trip to northern Minnesota, where the pipeline is being upgraded, Omar and her allies echoed the arguments of Indigenous and environmental activists that the pipeline project would worsen climate change, violate Native American treaty rights, and risk spills in waters where Indigenous people hunt, fish and gather wild rice.

“We are here because the climate crisis is here,” Omar said. “The climate crisis is now. The climate crisis is happening and the last thing we need to do is allow the very criminals who created this crisis to build more fossil fuel infrastructure."

The visit comes days after Omar sent a letter signed by nearly 50 state legislators and members of Congress to ask the Biden administration to meet with tribal leaders.

The heads of several Minnesota state agencies this week pushed back against several points in Omar's letter, saying it exaggerated how much water Enbridge has pumped out of construction ditches amid the current drought and that the amount was actually well within approved limits. They also said claims in Omar's letter that law enforcement used police dogs to intimidate protesters and fired "less-lethal" rubber bullets against...