America Is Turning Environmentalists into Terrorists

CW: Suicide In 2007, Daniel McGowan, and his co-defendants  step into federal court. They stand ready to   hear the final sentencing decision from the  Oregon District Court’s Judge Ann Aiken. Over   the course of five years, McGowan, and the  Earth Liberation Front cell he was a part of,   destroyed over $48 million of industrial  property across more than 40 acts of   sabotage. Their prison terms would come to define  a new era of state repression against activists.    This era, of harsh sentences for property  damage and even for attending protests,   has continued to this day. And it would, nine  years later, shape the reaction to one of the   fiercest battles against fossil capitalism in the  US: the fight against the Dakota Access Pipeline. [Play intro music] Our Changing Climate’s finances  aren’t looking amazing. So,   I want to make quick ask for your support  as I transition this chanel to become a   viewer-supported endeavour. If you don’t have the  financial means right now, no worries, click ahead   to this timecode to watch the rest of the video.   But if you do have the means, I’ll give it to you   straight. As of this month, I’ve chosen to forgo  most sponsorships and my ad revenue for YouTube   is declining pretty rapidly. The channel is on  a financial downtrend. Nothing dramatic will   happen to the channel just yet, but up until  now,, the majority of the channel’s revenue,   some 2/3rds comes from in-video sponsorships and  YouTube ad revenue. And those have pretty much   disappeared, and as I dive into more controversial  and leftist topics like this one, the threat of   demonetization only makes things worse. This is  where you come in. The last third of my revenue   has come from the backbone of this channel, the  Our Changing Climate Patreon supporters. Over   750 of ya’ll pledge to back OCC month in and month  out, and that support is the sole reason I’m able   to take big risks like making this three-part  series on the Earth Liberation Front. Sadly,   Patreon support hasn’t been enough to sustain  this channel. To pull back the curtain a bit,   it is just me, Charlie, working to bring you all  this ecosocialist content for free every month.    This series alone took six months of work, and I  did that work with no prospect of getting paid or   even the video doing well. I just want to put out  high-quality and engaging stories that examine the   climate crisis, capitalist destruction, and what  we can do about it. And I want the videos that   I make to be free and accessible to everyone.   Unfortunately, though, I have to pay my rent,   healthcare costs, and the remarkably extreme  prices of 3d models and assets. Looking towards   the future, I’m hoping to continue making  big, high-quality series like this one,   but if I’m not able to make the finances work, I  might need to reassess. So, this year I’m want to   double down on Patreon, and make this channel  entirely viewer supported. So, if you have the   means to keep this channel afloat, literally  just a quarter of the cost of one movie ticket,   I humbly ask that you support OCC on Patreon.   And, I want to make becoming a channel supporter   a mutually beneficial relationship. So, when  you become a member on Patreon, you get access   to all of my videos, including the next episode in  this series, one month early and ad-free. We also   have lovely little Discord community for talking  climate and leftist politics, and there’s also a   trove of bonus videos and extended content as  well. If something else might entice you to   become a supporter of Our Changing Climate, please  do let me know. If you’re still here, thanks for   watching, and if you become a Patreon supporter to  keep these videos high-quality and free for all,   you have my endless gratitude. You are  truly amazing. Anyways back to the video

The Roundup Back in 2005,   as four agents storm into the offices of WomensLaw  in New York City to arrest Daniel McGowan, across   the country, a raid begins on the Catalyst  Infoshop in Prescott, Arizona. There, the   co-founder of the community space and bookstore,  Bill Rodgers, known formerly as Avalon, was in the   midst of starting his day. Since his time setting  fires along the ridgeline of Vail and the offices   of the University of Washington, Rodgers had built  up Catalyst alongside his co-founders as a place   for activists, radicals, and organizers. [Sarah  Launius: The catalyst is a very necessary space   within this community]. He hoped to forge a place  of generation where people could share ideas and   be in community. This wasn’t surprising after all.   For many, Rodgers was a deeply principled man,   whose compassion and empathy for those around  him made the Catalyst Infoshop an inviting place. December 7th, 2005 started like any old day.   Rodgers was sorting through some of the book   stock in the backroom of Catalyst, when, all of  a sudden, 15 FBI agents busted down the door.    They stormed through the bookshop to the back  room, where they found a calm Bill Rodgers. They   immediately cuffed him, and as Bill Rodgers was  pushed out the door, the agents trashed the place. [Randall Amster: 15 or so federal agents  had cordoned off the space. They preceded   to search the place top to bottom. They  searched it for about eight hours]. But their long search was fruitless. The agents  found few pieces of evidence worth their time. On that day, while Bill Rodgers rode  handcuffed to the police station,   five other ELF members of the Pacific Northwest  cell were rounded up across four states. The state   repression that followed wouldn’t just lead to  years behind bars, but would also lead to death…

[transition music] Destroying Pipelines It’s twelve years later in 2017, and   two women hunch over a strip of the Dakota Access  Pipeline at a shut-off valve station. Sparks from   their oxyacetylene torches illuminate their faces.   After minutes of cutting, they finally make their   way through the steel shell of the pipeline. They  inspect their work. With this kind of structural   damage, the owner of the pipeline, Energy Transfer  Partners, would now have to shut off the flow of   crude oil in this section until repairs are made.   It was time to move on to their next target. From March to May of 2017 these two saboteurs  waged a war of attrition against Energy Transfer   Partners. They made their way up and down  the Dakota Access Pipeline throughout Iowa,   wreaking havoc on the company’s fossil  fuel infrastructure. Their names are   Jessica Reznicek and Ruby Montoya. And for  them, sabotage was seemingly the only tactic   left that might scare the Energy Transfer  Partners into backing away from finishing   construction of a pipeline line that would  lock-in carbon emissions equivalent to that of   21. 4 million cars per year. As the ELF had done  with arson more than a decade before, these two   were trying to hit the fossil fuel industry  where it hurt them the most: their profits. But much like the members of ELF cells,  sabotage only became a tactic after the   long struggle and failure of  countless other alternatives. As Montoya and Reznicek would soon learn, however,   with escalated tactics comes an escalated  response from those that hold profits so dear…

2005 After the December 7th raids on   Catalyst Infoshop, on WomensLaw, and a number of  other homes where the former ELF members had faded   into obscurity, all hell broke loose. The Green  Scare descended on the environmental community. [“In December of 2005 the FBI does a big roundup  of these individuals and of course they had   psychologically profiled the individuals and they  knew who was most likely to become a snitch next] [Attorney General: Today’s indictment is a  step in bringing these terrorists to justice] But four ELF members managed to escape the  state crackdown. One was Joseph Dibee, who,   back in the 1995 Warner Creek encampment,  was known as Seattle. A man with a knack   for engineering who oversaw the massive  bipod construction over the gates of the   blockade and helped drill holes into the  side of the Cavel West slaughterhouse and   filled them with diesel fuel. An activist who  had long stood in the path of industry, and   had fallen in love with the natural world after  moving to Oregon from Syria when he was eight. That day, on December 7th, the FBI corner  Dibee and hand him a grand jury subpoena.    The agents claim that they had  evidence mounting against him,   thanks to Jacob Ferguson, and tell him to  co-operate or risk contempt charges. Federal   agents once again wield the cudgel of a grand  jury to intimidate a suspect into cooperating. Two days later, he and his lawyer meet with  federal agents who lay out the case. The agents   urge Dibee to become an informant before the  indictments came, claiming that they know he   has guns hidden away. At that moment,  Dibee knows the writing is on the wall. Later reflecting on the meeting, Dibee  explains, “I’m a Middle Eastern person,   and it’s not lost on me the implications of  that in the United States… the government   started the conversation by saying, ‘We know he  has firearms. ’ and ‘Do you want to do what we tell   you to, or are we going to come get you? ’ That’s  a very thinly veiled threat. I took it as that. ” So, Joseph Dibee sheds his new life at  Microsoft, calls up a trusted friend, and,   according to prosecutors, makes his getaway.   The two hop in a car and drive to the Mexico   border. Where he hopes to escape the reach  of the FBI. He makes it to the toll booth,   hands over his papers. Sweat trickles  down his back. The guard glances Dibee   over… and then waves him through.   Dibee’s now free, at least for now. [transition music]

Many others, however, stayed put. Federal agents  detained six other ELF members that day. The cops   made the former ELF members stew in jail and then  laid out their evidence in front of the likes of   Chelsea Gerlach, who went by Country Girl and  helped drive the getaway truck for Bill Rodgers   after he burned down Vail, and Stan Meyerhoff, an  integral part of the cell who helped orchestrate   the burning of the Romania SUV dealership and  helped plan the Vail fires. Or Suzanne Savoie,   who took part in the Superior Lumber and Jefferson  Poplar actions. As each defendant faced down the   possibility of multiple decades behind bars and  the wire taps and confessions from Jacob Ferguson,   information started flowing. Comrades turned  on comrades to minimize their prison sentences. [Savoie talking about how you  don’t think its going to happen] It was in this swirling chaos of arrests and  betrayal that Avalon– now going by his given name,   Bill Rodgers– the defender of the lynx, entered  the Flagstaff jail in Arizona to await trial.    But a trial would never come. It would be  the last time he would ever taste freedom. For fourteen days, Rodgers sat in jail. Federal  agents pressured him to confess his crimes daily.    For fourteen days, in the tight confines of  his cell, Avalon’s light dimmed, facing down   potentially life in prison for destroying the  property of a few corporations. Then on December   21, 2005, the winter solstice, the darkest  day of the year, Avalon took his own life. In a final note to his friends, he scrawled  out a message on a scrap piece of paper:   “I chose to fight on the side of bears,  mountain lions, skunks, bats, saguaros,   cliff rose, and all things wild. I am just  the most recent casualty in that war. But   tonight I have made a jail break –  I am returning home, to the Earth,   to the place of my origins. ” As the ink dried,  Bill Rodgers quenched the fire of his life. [Ilse Asplund: Our friend was put in jail. He  was labeled a terrorist, and then he died. And   whether he died because he put a plastic bag over  his face or was put in front of a wall and shot,   it’s a political death, and it has to  be understood in a political context]

[Transition music] Two years later In his sister’s apartment in New York City,   Daniel McGowan types away on his keyboard,  vigorously researching the law surrounding his   upcoming sentencing. It’s been two years since his  arrest at the offices of WomensLaw, and he’s been   on house arrest almost all of that time– a thick  black ankle bracelet blinking conspicuously on   his leg 24/7. Tomorrow, a judge will finally  decide the course of the rest of his life. The next day, as he steps into the courthouse,  however, McGowan and his lawyers are confident.    In the years leading up to this sentencing  decision, McGowan’s lawyers managed to find   a pressure point that made the prosecutors back  off on those who had chosen not to cooperate.    They requested information about whether federal  agents had illegally wiretapped the ELF cell as a   means to gather evidence. As one analysis  of the Operation Backfire case explains,   “The government was loath to answer this question,  and for good reason: there had just been a public   scandal about NSA wiretaps, and if the court found  that wiretaps had been used unconstitutionally,   the entire Operation Backfire case would have  been thrown out. ” Even still, the prosecutors   had a mountain of evidence against him. McGowan  had to take a non-cooperation plea deal, and   the ploy would only serve to possibly lessen the  charges and hopefully shrink his final sentencing. And then, the moment finally comes. McGowan  stands. The judge monologues. At one point   the prosecutors compare the ELF to the Ku Klux  Klan, and then Judge Ann Aiken hands down the   sentence. Seven years in federal prison. The  gavel hits the wood below with a hollow smack.    McGowan’s fate is decided. For those that didn’t  turn on their co-defendants, the sentencings were   equally severe. But interestingly, those  that did cooperate got roughly the same,   if not longer sentences. As an article from  Crimethinc argues, “The Green Scare cases show   that cooperating with the government is never  in a defendant’s best interest. On average,   the non-cooperating defendants in Operation  Backfire are actually serving less time in   proportion to their original threatened sentences  than the informants. ” (The exception to this was   the first government collaborator, Jacob  Ferguson, who received no jail time. ) As the dust settled, the judge required  McGowan to report to federal prison on   July 2, 2007. But his experience  there would be far from normal. Blocking a pipeline In 2014, the executives

of Energy Transfer Partners had a problem on their  hands. They had too much crude oil to deliver and   not enough infrastructure to handle it. Thanks  to the 2006 discovery of the Bakken shale oil   formation in the North Dakota oil boom, alongside  new horizontal and hydraulic fracking technology,   North Dakota became a gold mine. By 2014, fossil  capitalists were extracting over a million barrels   of oil a day from the land. But fossil fuel  extraction companies kept hitting a bottleneck.    To truly cash in on their black gold, they  had to rely on rail lines connecting these   oil fields to refineries and ports.   So, Energy Transfer Partners set out   to build a 1,172-mile-long (1,886 km) pipeline  stretching from the oil fields of North Dakota   all the way to southern Illinois. They were  ready to make millions off of this project,   except that as the time came to build the pipeline  that would cross hundreds of bodies of water in   four states, sacred Indigenous burial sites,  and reservation boundaries, resistance grew. At the Standing Rock reservation, thousands of  Indigenous people and comrades came together to   fight back. In 2016, Indigenous organizers erected  multiple encampments from which groups would   strike out and stand in the path of the oncoming  pipeline construction almost every day. Meanwhile,   leaders of the Standing Rock Sioux took to the  courts suing U. S. Army Corps of Engineers for   violating the National Historic Preservation Act  and other laws, while others gathered over 33,000   signatures for an Environmental Impact Statement,  arguing that the pipeline would inevitably leak–   especially considering that pipelines that Energy  Transfer Partner owned had leaked 349 times since   2012, which was a rate of almost 100 times  per year at that point. Across the country,   people stood up in anger. Solidarity  marches in major cities, encampments,   and hunger strikes urged then-President Barack  Obama to shut down the pipeline. To pull its   permits and shutter it, much like had been done  to the Keystone XL pipeline two years before. It’s here, in late October of 2016, that we  find Ruby Montoya and Jessica Reznicek in a   holding cell. At an anti-pipeline protest, while  private guards and North Dakota police unleashed   attack dogs, tear gas, rubber bullets, and pepper  spray on indigenous protestors and comrades at the   Standing Rock encampments, Reznicek and Montoya  were arrested for allegedly trespassing on Energy   Transfer Partner land. There in that cell,  facing down the failure of all other options   and the rapid pace of the pipeline construction,  the two realized what they had to do next. If the   pipeline was the problem, they had to attack  it, and the equipment building it, directly.

So, on November 8, 2016, the night that Donald  Trump would lose the popular vote but still win   the presidential election, Montoya and Reznicek  got to work. They punctured a half dozen coffee   tins with holes, stuffed them with rags, threw  them in their truck alongside some motor oil,   and set off down Iowa’s Highway 7. After driving  for roughly two hours, they had finally reached   their target. A pipeline construction site right  off the highway. They pulled off and got to work.    Methodically soaking the rag-filled coffee cans  with oil, the two place each tin on the seat of   four excavators, a bulldozer, and a crane at  the site. One by one, they strike a match and   start the burn. By the time they pull out of the  worksite, flames engulfed 6 of the excavators. Afterward, as the firefighters quenched  the inferno, little but the husks of the   equipment was left. $2. 5 million in damages  for a couple of minutes of work. But this   was just an opening salvo. A shot across the  bow of Energy Transfer Partners attempting to   stop or at least slow down the reckless  pursuit of profits at the cost of water,   land, and people. Over the next  six months, Reznicek and Montoya’s   war of attrition would rain hell on the  pipeline invading their home state of Iowa.

Communications Management It’s July 2nd, 2007.    Daniel McGowan takes his first step into  federal prison. Today begins his seven-year   sentence after pleading guilty to burning  the property of the Jefferson Poplar Research   farm. This low-security prison in Sandstone,  Minnesota, far away from his family and wife,   would become his confines for the next  seven years of his life…at least that’s   what he thought. Although the first few months  behind bars were rough, McGowan soon settled in. [Daniel McGowan: You have controlled  movement. Every hour you have to get   to where you’re going, but you go to  the library, you go to the dentists,   doctor, you go to  the track, I played pickleball]. At Sandstone, McGowan was still able  to write articles for the Earth First!    Journal about the environment and prisons. He  was allotted 300 minutes of phone time a month,   and when his wife managed to get time off of  work, she could come see him in the visiting room,   play board games, and hug and kiss  goodbye. [Daniel McGowan: You go to   visiting. You have contact visits. You can hug  your friends. Have an ice cream bar, whatever. ]   McGowan was by no means comfortable, but it was  certainly better than what he was about to face. Seven months into his sentence, McGowan was in  the yard when a prison guard announced his name   over the loudspeaker, and he was told to report to  the shipping and receiving department. Confused,   McGowan made his way to the office. Perhaps he  had received a package from his wife? Tomorrow was   their second wedding anniversary after all. But as  McGowan entered the room, no such package was in   sight; instead, a staffer handed him a couple of  boxes and told him to pack up his things. He was   being moved. When McGowan asked for clarification  on where he was going, the prison staffer   stonewalled him and threw him in a cell to wait  until the bus arrived. It was only once McGowan   was pushed on the bus heading south to Illinois,  that the guards finally told him, “Marion. ” [Daniel McGowan: I’m like, where am I going  man? I’ve only been here seven months out   of nowhere I get transferred.   Oh man you’re going to Marion]. Little did he know, McGowan was headed for a new,  secretive experimental prison. One that sectioned   a part of the federal prison in Marion, Illinois,  to create a high security detainment center meant   to disappear dissenters, prisoners with high  profile cases, and perhaps most importantly   for the State, alleged terrorists. McGowan  was headed for what would come to be known   as “little Guantanamo. ” A prison to silence  political dissidents that the government called   a “Communications Management Unit” or CMU for  short. And the conditions at the CMU were horrible [Daniel McGowan: I show up, there’s like 18  dudes there. We occupy one range… Everything   you do is in that unit. We had a tiny  yard with razor wire and cages, and we   essentially lived in the former segregation  unit at Marion… It’s a miserable place…] For a state that was in the midst of a war  on terror, Daniel McGowan’s outspoken views   on police repression, environmental issues,  and abolition in the Earth First! Journal,   alongside his “terrorism” sentencing,  couldn’t go unpunished. So they took   away the only thing he had left: his voice.   Indeed, most of McGowan’s fellow inmates were   people who the government didn’t want to be  in the media. They wanted them to disappear. [Daniel McGowan: People that are  held there are very politically   charged cases. Cases that are either um  the focus of scrutiny by the media or   uh cases that the government doesn't  want to um be dragged through the media. ] McGowan was a political prisoner. One  of many caught in the crosshairs of a   government that couldn’t countenance  any feasible threat to its power. [Daniel McGowan: It’s a complete  punishment unit. They want to bury   you there. So they take people who had access  to the media and they just want to bury you. ]

Across the world, Joseph Dibee was carving out  his own way towards freedom. After Dibee reached   the Mexican border in 2005, he managed to make  a safe crossing and found himself in a land he   didn’t know, with no connections, so he followed  his roots. Dibee’s father had grown up in Syria,   and immigrated to the United States when Dibee  was young, which is part of the reason why Dibee   decided to run. He knew that the United  States government would come down hard   on a West Asian man especially when the  wounds of 9/11 were still festering. So,   Dibee made his way to Syria, and built a life  for himself. He soon found a position at the   University of Kalamoon teaching computer science  and renewable engineering, and lived in a housing   complex with other like-minded scientists.   Dibee would live a quiet life of learning,   teaching, and science. He would be instrumental in  conceptualizing renewable technologies of Syria,   that is until 2011, when all hell  broke loose across the country.

Across the Atlantic, as McGowan entered his second  year under government repression in the CMU,   the last flames of the Earth Liberation Front  flickered out and died. On September 4th, 2009,   the ELF claimed responsibility for the  destruction of two broadcasting towers. [Newscaster: Massive radio tower  sabotage with an excavator in Snohomish   County and then there was a message left at the  scene… The radical underground environmentalist   group Earth Liberation Front has just claimed  responsibility for this act of destruction] This would be the last publicly claimed Earth  Liberation Front action in the United States. In   total, the ELF claimed 462 acts, totaling upwards  of $100 million in property damages according   to some estimates. This historical specter  certainly influenced the fossil capitalists   and the State in their hunt for and subsequent  crack down on Jessica Reznicek and Ruby Montoya.

The crackdown After pulling   off their first arson at the construction site,  Montoya and Reznicek pivoted to a different tool:   the oxyacetylene torch. With a super-hot  flame fueled by pure oxygen, these torches   can bore holes through the thick steel hulls  of pipelines, which is exactly what Montoya   and Reznicek did over the next three months  between March and May 2017. After teaching   themselves how to wield these fire cutters, the  two started their war against the pipeline. Their   goal was, according to Reznicek not to [“delay  construction not just for days, but for weeks and   months for the ultimate purpose of shutting this  pipeline down and having investors pull out. ”] Across Iowa, the two hit pipeline hulls  with their torches and damaged construction   equipment with their tried and true coffee  tin igniters. Delaying construction for weeks,   they hit four different points in the pipelines  path and stopped 30 million barrels of oil from   reaching refineries. Unlike the ELF, however, very  little was made of these attacks in the media. One   local station in March of 2017, mentioned that  saboteurs had burned holes into a pipeline at   valve station, while another radio station  reported tampering, but that was it. Radio   silence as the world watched the construction  of the Dakota Access Pipeline quickly descend   towards its terminus in southern Illinois,  just 93 miles away from the Communications   Management Unit at Marion where Daniel  McGowan was imprisoned. Ultimately, however,   the power of capital survived the sabotage siege.   The momentum of the fossil fuel industry brushed   these acts of sabotage that caused millions  of dollars in damages off like a mosquito. As the pipeline construction neared completion,   Montoya and Reznicek felt exhausted.   They had done all they could do,   but fossil-fueled capitalism continued unabated.   But the two had one last desperate move they   could make to draw attention to the environmental  travesty they saw unfolding across the Midwest. On July 24th of that year, Montoya  and Reznicek drove to the offices of   the Iowa Utilities Board which had issued the  pipeline permits to Energy Transfer Partners,   with a backpack filled with a hammer,  crowbar, and a collection of papers. There,   in front of the sign that read Iowa  Utilities Board, the two pulled the   papers from their bag and began to read in  front of the news crews and lawyers present. [Ruby Montoya: Some may view these actions as  violent, but be not mistaken. We acted from   our hearts and never threatened human  life nor personal property. ==What we   did do was fight a private corporation  that has run rampant across our country,   seizing land and polluting our nation’s water  supply. You may not agree with our tactics,   but you can clearly see their necessity in  light of the broken federal government and   the corporations they represent. ] In front of the Utility Board sign   and media cameras. Ruby Montoya and Jessica  Reznicek confessed to the sabotage campaign   they had carried out in defense of the land and  water. With their final act, they pulled the   hammer and crowbar out of the bag and started to  dismantle the sign behind them. They were almost   immediately arrested. And their arrests and  sentencing couldn’t have come at a worse time.

In 2017, the forces of fossil capital  were mobilizing. Fossil fuel corporations   and their subsidiaries lobbied politicians,  and leaned heavily on law enforcement and private   mercenaries like TigerSwan to criminalize and  sideline activists as a means to protect their   extractivist interests. During that year, in  the wake of the Dakota Access Pipeline protests,   fossil fuel lobbyists and politicians pushed for  so-called “Critical infrastructure laws. ” These   laws were (and still are) at the forefront of this  effort to paint climate activists as terrorists   in the eyes of the public. The past tactics the  state wielded against the Earth Liberation Front   have been born anew. Since 2017, 45 states have  considered 356 bills limiting people's right to   assembly and protest, with 23 states enacting laws  that place felony charges of domestic terrorism   and conspiracy on protestors who trespass or  sabotage “critical infrastructure. ” In the eyes   of these laws, this critical infrastructure  has been expanded to now encompass facilities   like oil pipelines, natural gas refineries, and  storage tanks. Infrastructure that is directly   causing climate change, and leading to the death  of millions of people each year from air pollution   alone. Through this slew of legislation, the state  can not only directly protect the infrastructure   of the fossil fuel industry by targeting  and criminalizing environmental activists,   but they also lock in oil and gas infrastructure  as essential in the eyes of the law. It was within this swirling tempest of  anti-environmental protest sentiment   that Reznicek and Montoya had to  plead their case. They argued,   together with their lawyers, that this was an  act of necessity. They were defending land,   water and people from the much larger  crimes of Energy Transfer Partners. [Jessica Reznicek: we committed a crime  but it's to prevent a larger crime from   happening… it's the same kind of ideology of  like if a building were burning and there's   a baby inside I'm gonna break a window and go  in and get that baby and bring that baby out] Despite the intense legal battle  Montoya and Reznicek waged,   the judge would not see the humanity in their  actions. Reznicek was sentenced to eight years   in prison. What would have been a 3 to 4 year  sentence was turned into eight years followed   by three years of parole. All because  Jessica Reznicek was deemed a terrorist. Montoya was sentenced to six years in federal  prison, and she, too, was slapped with a terrorist   enhancement for welding holes in a pipeline valve.   They are still in the carceral system today.

Free* While Montoya and Reznicek were in the   midst of radicalization and while the blueprints  for the Dakota Access Pipeline were making their   way through the board rooms of Energy Transfer  Partners, Daniel McGowan took his first step of   freedom. The year is 2013, and for good behaviour  he’s placed in a halfway house for six months,   until he publishes an op-ed explaining the  unconscionable repression he experienced at   the hands of the capitalist State. In documents  later uncovered by the Freedom of Information act,   this op-ed led to McGowan’s re-imprisonment.   Once again, McGowan was placed in prison for   speaking out against the unseen terrors of the  State. A State that silences and disappears those   who attempt to stop or reveal the harm it does to  protect even more harmful industries. But Daniel   McGowan, finally, left the carceral system in June  of 2013. Years later, as McGowan reflects on the   Earth Liberation Front, he seems conflicted:  [38:32 - I felt that what we were doing was   not particularly effective after a period  of time– we got addicted to the most “bang”] If anything, though, the Earth Liberation Front  was an emphatic punctuation mark on the history   of the United States. Over the course of 13 years,  they glued, smashed, and burned their way into the   minds of capitalists across the nation. Leafing  through the group’s trail of sabotage, however,   it seems as if the $100 million in property  damage did little to move the needle. Did the   Earth Liberation Front fail? But perhaps a more  important question: what can the climate movement   today learn from the ELF, and more recently the  exploits of Jessica Reznicek and Ruby Montoya? Critiques of the Earth Liberation Front abound  from all over the political spectrum. To focus in   on what the climate movement might learn from  the ELF, three points are worth mentioning.    First, the decentralized, leaderless  resistance model made long-term, organized,   and targeted campaigns almost impossible. The  nature of the cells lent itself to ideological   heterogeneity and a scattershot approach to  industrial sabotage. While this did mean that,   as sociologist Paul Joose writes, “leaderless  resistance fosters… ideological inclusiveness,”   meaning that it can mobilize numerous  different actions without political   debate. The wide array of targets, from a ski  resort to a McDonald’s to a logging company,   meant that there never was and could never  be a targeted effort to topple one specific   industry, like logging. The ELF destroyed property  that, in the long run, capitalists could shrug off   especially with insurance, knowing that these  acts of sabotage were not accompanied by a   highly mobilized mass movement. Looking towards  how the climate movement might learn from this,   Andreas Malm writes, “This implies that climate  militancy would have to be articulated to a   wider anti-capitalist groundswell, much as  in earlier shifts of modes of production,   when physical attacks on ruling classes formed  only minor parts of society-wide reorganization. ” Here we see the second critique unfold. The  Earth Liberation Front was much too focused   on sabotage and not enough on mobilizing  a mass, working class movement. The Earth   Liberation Front was necessarily an underground  movement. Cells were taking to acts of sabotage   in the face of a deeply hostile capitalist state.   But, after the ash settled at sites of sabotage,   there was no mass environmental movement at the  time to complement this radical flank. In short,   there was very little coordination. Perhaps if  there were, the Earth Liberation Front’s property   destruction might have made deeper inroads  into dismantling capitalist extraction. Here,   we can see Montoya and Reznicek’s sabotage  swarm tactics in a different light. The   indigenous-led struggle against the Dakota  Access Pipeline was already in full swing.    Daily protests struck out from a series of  camps established on the lands of Standing   Rock Sioux. These peaceful protests were  met with attack dogs, pepper spray, batons,   and tear gas. There was already a mass  mobilization against the Dakota Access   Pipeline when Reznicek and Montoya took their  blowtorches to the pipeline. Indeed, it was   only after the writing was on the wall for the  Standing Rock encampments and the violent State   repression of Indigenous protestors, that Reznicek  and Montoya escalated to property destruction. Part of the groundswell of support against  the Dakota Access Pipeline came from long   hours of organizing and coordination, but  also positive media attention towards the   anti-pipeline movement. Couched  in this anti-pipeline narrative,   Montoya and Reznicek’s tactics became tolerable.   The world had seen the violence that both private   security and public police officers used against  nonviolent protestors to defend the property of   Energy Transfer Partners, so damaging a pipeline  seemed justified. Granted, in the U. S., sabotage   is almost always taboo. Even if that piece of  property being sabotaged will kill thousands. [Ruby Montoya: The idea that property destruction  is somehow violent is an unexamined belief]

Finding Freedom In 2011, Joseph Dibee was developing a potentially   groundbreaking renewable array for Syria. Since  fleeing the Green Scare crackdown, Dibee sought   to protect the earth around him not through  destruction, but through generation. He, and   a team of scientists, were building a prototype  for a massive solar array that could generate 35%   of Syria’s electricity needs while also creating  much-needed potable water as a byproduct through   desalination. They were about to embark on  the pilot project, when civil war broke out   across Syria. Dibee and his coworkers soon became  targets. Militant forces targeted Dibee’s housing   complex, and he very narrowly escaped to a nearby  village, where he hid for 10 days in pure terror.    Some of Dibee’s coworkers were not as lucky, and  were murdered on the doorsteps of their home. Haunted by the specter of war, Dibee once  again fled a country he called home. This time,   to Moscow, where he fell in love  and built a third life. In Russia,   he attempted to launch a biodiesel venture, but  failed twice, as his partners turned on him with   corrupt intentions. Depleted and strung out,  Dibee was done with life on the run. He hired   a team of attorneys to negotiate a surrender  deal with the U. S., but they denied him once,   then twice. It was decided: Moscow would be his  home. That is, until a twist of fate would once   again turn Joseph Dibee’s life on its head  on a business trip in Ecuador. His past of   burning down the Cavel West horse rendering  facility would finally catch up to him.

The last lesson: In the echoes of   the Cavel West fire we can see the third critique  at play. The ELF’s scattershot sabotage campaign   lacked context. Despite the valiant efforts of  Craig Rosebraugh and Leslie Pickering with the   ELF Press Office, the media soured on the Earth  Liberation Front. There was no clear connection   between Superior lumber, Vail, and the GMO  research at University of Washington that the   media could easily latch onto. There wasn’t  a mass campaign against timber extraction,   nor a general anti-capitalist movement against  extractive industries to hold the ELF accountable.    There was no mass movement for the Earth  Liberation Front to be their radical flank. So,   the ELF could be painted as outlaw acts—the  lashing out of a minuscule minority. [John Stossol: You don’t know  anything. You’re just a kid] This is not to say that there wasn’t any  movement that the Earth Liberation Front   was flanking. The fires at Cavel West and  Vail, for example, seemed to be extensions   of a longer non-violent struggle against those  particular industries. The cell took to arson   only once it seemed that road blockades, court  battles and public hearings had been exhausted.    But on the whole, cells often were isolated from  the broader environmental activist community. [McGowan: Some of these people in my  group were sort of cut off. They just   cut off from the world, and I feel like  cutting yourself off from the world can   create really, like. It led to some real big  theoretical mistakes. Not even theoretical,   applied mistakes that we made because  we cut off, we were out of touch. ] And without the support of the public, or at least  the support and connection to the political left,   the State could crack down hard on the ELF with  impunity. Cells were subjected to surveillance,   alleged phone taps, and grand jury intimidation;  it was hard not to break under the pressure.    Today, all of those tactics of political  repression are multiplied in an age of   smartphones, critical infrastructure laws, AI  surveillance, and private mercenary groups. Ultimately, though, the splintering of the  Earth Liberation Front doesn’t necessarily   mean it was a failure. If anything, it  can teach today’s climate organiziners   lessons and strategies for building  a stronger and effective movement. [Daniel McGowan: Just because what you did  wasn’t perfect doesn’t mean it was a mistake,   it doesn’t mean that other people  can’t take it and improve upon it] Clearly, the Earth Liberation Front did at least  something right because, despite not killing   a single person, the State was so scared of a  potential public-backed Earth Liberation Front,   that they labeled them the number one domestic  terrorist threat and hunted them down with   abandon. And that hunt would finally track down  Joseph Dibee during a layover in El Salvador.

The Capture It’s 2018. Daniel McGowan is   five years out of prison, 750,000 barrels of oil  flow through the Dakota Access Pipeline each day,   a number of spills have already wreaked  havoc on surrounding water systems,   and Montoya and Reznicek are gearing up  to fight for a fair sentencing in court.   Joseph Dibee, meanwhile, is on his way back from  a business trip in Ecuador. During a layover,   the El Salvadoran National Police stop Dibee  and bring him in for questioning. The air is   tense. Could this be the moment when the long  arm of the FBI finally captures him? But as he   sits through the interrogation, it quickly becomes  clear that his detainment is racially motivated.    They seem to know nothing of his past with the  Earth Liberation Front. According to Dibee,   many of the other people waiting to be  questioned were of West Asian descent.    His suspicions were confirmed as one of the  officers rushed through his fingerprint process,   complaining to another cop that  “we need to hurry him along. ” As Dibee walked out of the interrogation  room, his shoulders relaxed. He was free.    But he was already late for his connecting flight.   Running through the airport, he manages to board,   and makes it to Havana, Cuba. One last  26-hour layover before he can get home   to his wife and stepson in Moscow.   As Dibee curls up to get some sleep,   he feels a tap on his shoulder. Three Cuban  officials tower over him. The biometric data   that the El Salvadoran cops obtained had pinged  a hit. The FBI had finally found its white whale. The three cops pushed Dibee out  of the airport and into a car,   driving him to an undisclosed site where he  was caged and tortured for reasons that still   remain unclear. This was a kidnapping. For three  days, Dibee baked in the sweltering Cuban sun,   exacerbated by the hot concrete underneath his  skin. The jail guards withheld water, as Dibee,   now 50 years old, quickly dehydrated. He passed  out frequently, and thought he was going to die.    On the third day, officials that seemed to be  from the Cuban military intelligence hauled   him out of the cell into an air-conditioned  room, and handed him water. They were blunt,   “We think you’re a terrorist,” and Dibee made up  stories to appease them, but his interrogators   slowly, over the course of days, figured out who  he was, perhaps because they were talking to the   FBI at that point. Then, on August 9, 2018, the  torture ended. The Cubans handed one of the last   remaining Earth Liberation Front members of the  Pacific Northwest cell over to the Americans. [Newscaster: A Man Suspected  of ecoterrorism in Oregon and   Washington-on the run For more than a  decade is now Behind bars in Portland. ] Dibee was shipped to Portland, where this  journey all started. For a little under   2 and a half years, Joseph Dibee was  forced behind bars awaiting his trial.    He would survive a broken jaw from a punch from  a white supremacist inmate, be among the first   people in jail to contract COVID, and watch as  the country fought back against racist police   brutality in the summer of 2020. All of this  in punishment for burning down the property of   a business that killed wild horses. A crime  for which he had not even stood trial yet. But finally that day would come. He reached  a plea deal, and on November 2nd, 2022,   the Oregon District Court Judge announced the  sentencing decision. Joseph Dibee’s fate has   been decided. [news clip]. After pleading guilty  to two acts of arson, Dibee hoped to persuade   the judge he had already been through enough.   He was now almost 20 years removed from those   acts of sabotage. That was not him anymore. On  that day, Ann Aiken saw the humanity in Dibee,   and his sentence was lenient [play news clip  explaining sentencing]. Dibee wouldn’t have to   suffer the fate of so many of his fellow ELF  comrades. He could walk free. And as Dibee   leaves the courthouse, the last licks of Earth  Liberation Front flames flicker and burn out. But as the smoke clears, just over two  years later and over 900 miles south,   a raging fire destroys the homes of the  rich. Except this fire wasn’t sparked   by a firebomb. It’s a wildfire supercharged  by climate change. Los Angeles County reels   as 18,000 buildings are destroyed. An  estimated 440 lay dead. This is arson   on an unimaginable scale. And it’s caused  by the emissions of fossil fuel companies.    Emissions that Jessica Reznicek and Ruby Montoya  attempted to prevent. They now sit behind bars. As the State cracks down on those  attacking fossil capitalism,   they assure the continued existence of  out-of-control fires like the Los Angeles   fires—all to protect the infrastructure of the  fossil fuel industry dousing the planet in fuel. Fire, then, seems to be just a  matter of who holds the torch. A little while ago, I helped build a solar  array on a farm in California. At least,   I sort of did, because I didn’t  build it with power tools;   I helped fund the construction through  this video’s sponsor: Climatize. Climatize is a U. S. -based,  SEC-registered, FINRA-member,   investing platform that connects  people like you and me to vetted   renewable energy projects that are  seeking funding across the country. With Climatize, anyone over 18  with a U. S. bank account can   start contributing to clean energy projects  nationwide: from agrivoltaics in Maryland,   to a non-profit developing to a battery  storage project in New York. Each project   hosted on Climatize is vetted and filed  under SEC Regulation Crowdfunding, giving   you transparency to review details before deciding  if it aligns with your values and financial goals. And as with any investment, projects on Climatize   carry a risk of underperformance or  loss. This isn’t investment advice;   so please review all available information  before making any decisions on how you invest. Climatize is offering something special for  the Our Changing Climate community. When   you sign up using my link and use the code  OCCN50 to complete your Climatize profile,   you’ll receive $50 in investment credit.   You’ll earn that credit only once you’ve   completed your profile, and it’s only  available for use on their platform. A   minimum investment from the investor's  funds must be applied when using it. So, if you want to learn more about  projects working towards climate solutions,   sign up using the code OCCN50 and explore  at climatize. earth/ourchangingclimate.