Arizona border wall contractor's parent company is among most polluting companies destroying the planet

Saguaro cactus bulldozed by Southwest Valley Constructors near Ajo, Arizona, for illegal U.S. border wall.

Arizona border wall contractor's parent company is among most polluting companies destroying the planet 

Border wall contractor linked to Keystone Pipeline and Alberta Tar Sands

By Brenda Norrell

Censored News
French translation by Christine Prat

AJO, Arizona -- The parent company of Southwest Valley Constructors -- now building the border wall, violating all federal protection laws, destroying endangered species and bulldozing the pristine Sonoran Desert --  is a global mining and construction corporation that is one of the most polluting companies in the world.

Southwest's parent company Kiewit, based in Omaha, Nebraska, is listed as one of the top 32 North American polluters killing the planet.

The border wall contractor, Southwest Valley Constructors  based in Albuquerque, is now violating all federal protection laws created to protect endangered species, water and sacred sites, as it builds an illegal border wall based on political ruin, xenophobia and the collapse of the US government.

The endangered pupfish is found nowhere else in the world but here near Ajo in a spring sacred to Tohono O'odham.

Nearby, the migration paths of endangered jaguar and pronghorn antelope are being destroyed.

Protected saguaros are being ripped from the earth with disregard for state or federal laws.

The federal government has waived 41 federal laws that protect life as it builds the border wall.

In its lawsuit, the Center for Biological Diversity points out the damage to human rights, as the pristine desert borderzone is turned into a militarized zone.

"Beyond jeopardizing wildlife, endangered species and public lands, the U.S.-Mexico border wall is part of a larger strategy of ongoing border militarization that damages human rights, civil liberties, native lands, local businesses and international relations. The border wall impedes the natural migrations of people and wildlife that are essential to healthy diversity," the Center said.

Southwest Valley Constructors received $646 million in U.S. Army funds for border wall work in the contract from the U.S. Defense Department, with the Army Corps of Engineers in Albuquerque operating the contract. The use of U.S. military funds to build the border wall is the subject of numerous ongoing lawsuits.

Kiewit was also awarded a border wall contract in Texas, along the Rio Grande. "The $42.8 million contract was awarded to Kiewit Infrastructure West Co. The project, according to CBP, includes the construction of "18-30 foot tall steel bollards, in addition to road construction, detection technology and lighting installation," CNN reported.

Kiewit's projects around the world polluting the planet include construction for Suncor's tar sands in Alberta, Canada; mining nickel in Quebec; mining diamonds in Yellowknife, NWT; mining iron ore in Western Australia; mining coal in Wyoming; mining phosphates in Idaho; lignite mining in Texas; and nickel mining in Voisey's Bay, NF., according to its website.

Keystone Pipeline is among Kiewit's construction projects, which include oil, gas and oil sands construction projects elsewhere in Canada, North Dakota, Texas and Western Australia.

In North America, Houston and Calgary are the top cities where corporations are killing the planet, primarily with oil and gas and tar sands industries. In 2017, Kiewit received a contract from Houston-based Wood Group Mustang to build Israel's Leviathan offshore gas field platform.

The border wall construction in violation of federal protection laws is part of a greater scheme of the U.S. government that is now violating international laws which protect migrant children, including the genocidal act of separating children from their parents and disappearing the children.

Migrant children are being imprisoned in US death camps where they are being sexually abused and dying of neglect and preventable infections, according to documented cases of migrant child deaths.

The United States now leads the world in the widespread disregard for human life and the Earth.

Read more about top corporations killing the planet:

https://decolonialatlas.wordpress.com/2019/04/27/names-and-locations-of-the-top-100-people-killing-the-planet/

Copyright Brenda Norrell, Censored News

'Apaches Standing Strong to Defend Sacred Oak Flat from Mining' by Sandra Rambler

Photo by Sandra Rambler, San Carlos Apache

'Apaches Standing Strong to Defend Sacred Oak Flat from Mining' by Sandra Rambler

by Sandra Rambler, San Carlos Apache

Traditionally Speaking

Censored News

Chi’Chil’Bilda’Goteel (Oak Flat) -- How do you respond to a White Man whose name is Paul Gosar, an Arizona Congressman who recently said, “You’re still wards of the government.”

And then he continues and says, “One of the federal government’s dirty little secrets is that Native American tribes are not fully sovereign nations in today’s society.”

Dine' Medicine Men's Formal Objection to Desecration of Dook’o’oosliid, San Francsico Peaks

DINE’ MEDICINE MEN ASSOCIATION FORMAL STATEMENT OF OBJECTION 
December 4, 2019 
US Forest Service and Arizona Snowbowl Agassiz Chairlift Replacement and Upgrade Proposal

To: Cal Joyner, Regional Forester, 333 Broadway Blvd SE, Albuquerque, NM 87102

Responsible Officials: Calvin Joyner, Regional Forester
Laura Jo West, Forest Supervisor Coconino National Forest
Previous Comments: Dine’ Medicine Men Association
provided previous comments on August 30, 2019

We are continually discriminated against by federal agencies as they require us to reply in black and white, with a foreign language that is not our own and does not convey the full depth of our concerns.

Background

The Dine’ Be’ Nanagha’ Yee’ Da’Aho’ta’ (Dine’ Medicine Men Association, Inc.) is an established non-profit organization incorporated with the Navajo Nation since the early 1970s. We are an established and recognized organization of the Navajo Nation, we neither function with remuneration, nor as an established operation with specific sites. We are a membership of traditional apologists, spiritual Dine’ hataalii (healers), prophets, cultural educators, wisdom keepers, medicine people, elders and traditionalists who have come together willingly to maintain, protect and promote the Dine’ way of life, intellectual knowledge, right to self- determination and the fundamental right to worship the Great Spirit according to our sacred (holy) protocols.

Borderlands: Language and songs as resistance, waiting for the wall to come down

During the Borderlands Panel, Ofelia Rivas shares a painting by Casandra Productions honoring  Jakelin Caal Maquin. Jakelin, 7 years old, died in U.S. Border Patrol custody after being arrested near Lordsburg, New Mexico. Ofelia said Jakelin's death and the separation of migrant children from their parents is a continuation of the U.S. policy of genocide of Indigenous Peoples. Photo by Brenda Norrell.

Language and songs as resistance, waiting for the wall to come down

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News

SAN RAFAEL Calif. -- The United States is imprisoning migrant children and separating families. It is building a wall as a symbol of racism and separation and continuing the genocide of Indigenous Peoples in the Americas. The onslaught, however, has not silenced the languages or the songs, it has not killed the spirits.

Tohono O'odham Protest Against Border Wall and Israeli Spy Towers on Arizona Border

Tohono O'odham protested the border wall being constructed in the
fragile Sonoran Desert on Saturday, and the Israeli spy towers now
targeting the Tohono O'odham Naiton.
Photos copyright Ofelia Rivas.

(Photo above) U.S. military surveillance helicopter
over Gu-Vo community this morning on Tohono O'odham Nation. Below: in Gu-Vo community today.

Trump's Border Wall is Death to Endangered Species and Sacred Places

Photos by Ofelia Rivas, Tohono O'odham
Article by Brenda Norrell
Censored News copyright
Sat., Aug. 31, 2019

AJO, Arizona -- As Trump's bulldozers destroy the pristine Sonoran Desert at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument nearby, Tohono O'odham and Arizona residents are protesting the inhumane destruction.

Ofelia Rivas, Tohono O'odham who lives on the border, told Censored News, "Beautiful day in the O'odham homeland, united group of people came to be a voice for the lands and  nature against genocidal policies of an inhumane government system attacking all life."
"The Society of these stolen lands should legally charge these inhumane crimes against this disgraceful person."
"The group will continue to be a voice for the honor of the bees, the endangered sacred animals, plants and the entire land and people," Rivas said.

All endangered species laws and all laws protecting sacred Native American places have been smashed. The border wall construction is already using a vast amount of water in the desert here for concrete.
These defenders are also protesting the Israeli spy towers now targeting the Tohono O'odham Nation. The Israeli defense contractor Elbit Systems plans to construct these spy towers and destroy sacred burial places and ceremonial places on the Tohono O'odham Nation. The tribal government approved these spy towers in March, but Gu-Vo District continues to oppose this oppression and destruction. Elbit already carries out Apartheid security in Palestine.

Ofelia Rivas is the founder of O'odham Voice against the Wall, and has spent her life battling the abuses of the U.S. Border Patrol. Ofelia lives on the border on the Tohono O'odham Nation and is a voice for human rights.
Donate to Ofelia on her website, for gas funds for her work, at:
http://tiamatpublications.com/

Photos copyright Ofelia Rivas, Tohono O'odham.
Censored News
May not be used without permission.

More: Trump's bulldozers destroying the pristine Sonoran Desert and Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument! Photos and video:
https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2019/08/trumps-monster-bulldozers-now-ripping.html

Quitobaquito Springs -- Border Wall Construction Destroying Sacred and Fragile Sonoran Desert Ecosystem

Photos above copyright by the photographer

 Quitobaquito Springs

              By Brenda Norrell
               Censored News

Quitobaquito is a rare oasis in the desert that supplies life-sustaining water to many animal species, as shown here. This Sonoyta mud turtle is found nowhere else in the world. Nearby, as shown below, border wall construction has already started near Lukeville, Arizona.
Trump is using diverted military funds to build this monster, the border wall, and has eliminated all laws protecting endangered and sacred places and species. In this fragile Sonoran Desert, it is a crime against nature, a crime against all life forms.
These expensive pieces of a border wall -- between the long border stretch from east Texas to the California coast -- are targeting the most fragile regions, and will only serve to push migrants into more deadly zones. Instead of halting immigration, these pieces of the border wall will be no more than a symbol of white nationalism and destruction.
Ofelia Rivas, Tohono O'odham who lives on the border nearby on the Tohono O'odham Nation, asked, "Where are the Water Protectors?"
"Sources say each foot of border wall will require 2 cubic yards of concrete. A yard of the concrete takes 39 gallons of water. This means each mile of wall = 411,840 gallons of water," Rivas told Censored News.
As the monster construction is ongoing nearby, the photographer, a border resident, explained that the border vehicle barrier, shown in the top photo, is already in place and the enormous wall is not needed here, in this fragile zone.
"The vehicle barrier seen in the background allows wildlife to move freely across the southern border in Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. It keeps vehicles from driving across the border that could be very damaging to the sensitive environment."
Arizona Republic Raphael Carranza photos below: Trump uses diverted military funds to build border wall near Lukeville, Arizona, this week.

SAVING THE SONOYTA MUD TURTLE
The Center for Biological Diversity said, "The Sonoyta mud turtle has evolved as an aquatic species in one of the driest parts of the Sonoran Desert. With webbed feet and an innate ability to swim, this turtle depends heavily on what little water remains in the Southwest. The easiest way to identify a Sonoyta mud turtle is by its location since it's the only turtle inhabiting its very small range. The U.S. population has been reduced to a single reservoir within the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, named Quitobaquito Springs. In Mexico, these turtles inhabit a couple of small, still-flowing sections of the Rio Sonoyta."
Among the rare creatures found at Quiobaquito Springs is the endangered pupfish.
"The largest body of water at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument is Quitobaquito springs and pond, home to the Quitobaquito pupfish," writes Wild Sonora.
"The cultural significance of the Quitobaquito area dates to approximately 11,000 B.P. (before present)."The pond is the home of the Quitobaquito spring snail, the Sonoyta mud turtle, and the desert caper plant. This is the only spot in the United States where these species can be found naturally occurring," the National Park Service said.
"The desert caper supports the caper butterfly (ascia Howarthi) that is only found coexisting with the plant. The Quitobaquito spring snails are so small that they are hard to find."
"You can sometimes spot the snail, about the size of a grain of black pepper, in the spring-fed streams serving the pond. Quitobaquito is also the only place where the Sonoyta mud turtle is found in the United States and has been deemed a candidate for protection under the Endangered Species Act."

Call and/or write your Congressional Representatives and Senators and ask them
1. To stop the funding for this wall.
2. To repeal section 102 of the Real ID Act that dismisses decades of protective environmental, public health, and safety laws passed by congress.
FYI - Section 102 of the Real ID Act of 2005 waives 28 environmental and other laws (listed below) during a national emergency or under a threat of a terrorist attack. Since #45 declared an emergency at the border in order to get funding for the wall, the builders do not have to abide by laws that are required by all other types of construction.
Laws waived...

1)The National Environmental Policy Act

2)The Endangered Species Act

3)The Clean Water Act

4)The National Historic Preservation Act

5)The Migratory Bird Treaty Act

6)The Migratory Bird Conservation Act

7)The Clean Air Act

8)The Archeological Resources Protection Act

9)The Paleontological Resources Preservation Act

10)The Federal Cave Resources Protection Act

11)The Safe Drinking Water Act

12)The Noise Control Act

13)The Solid Waste Disposal Act

14)The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act

15)The Archaeological and Historic Preservation Act

16)The Antiquities Act

17)The Historic Sites, Buildings, and Antiquities Act

18)The Farmland Protection Policy Act

19)The Coastal Zone Management Act

20)The Federal Land Policy and Management Act

21)The National Wildlife Refuge System Administration Act

22)The National Fish and Wildlife Act

23)The Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act

24)The Administrative Procedure Act

25)The River and Harbors Act

26)The Eagle Protection Act

27)The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act

28The American Indian Religious Freedom Act



Organ Pipe nature photos: copyright by photographer, published with permission at Censored News

The Border: When the Mohawks came to the Tohono O'odham Nation

Kahentinetha Horn, publisher of Mohawk Nation News, shows her Haudenausaunee passport, while a Mohawk warrior holds the sacred Two Rows Wampum Belt of the Mohawks. Photo by Brenda Norrell, San Xavier, Tohono O'odham Nation.

Mohawks join a delegation of Pueblo, Lakota, Oneida, Dine' and South African on the border on the Tohono O'odham Nation in 2007. Photo by Brenda Norrell

"We were passing some of our strength on to them to fight," Kahentinetha Horn said after Mohawks rushed the US Border Patrol arresting Indigenous women and children on the Tohono O'odham Nation in 2007. Now, 12 years later, as Americans awake from their Walmart shopping induced coma, these words and this action have increased power and importance.

Article and photos by Brenda Norrell
Censored News
Originally published Nov. 8, 2007
Republished July 8, 2019

THE GATE, TOHONO O'ODHAM NATION (Arizona) --Indigenous delegates to the border on Tohono O'odham Nation land were outraged by the federal agents, hovering customs helicopter, profiteering contractors, federal spy tower, federal "cage" detention center and watching the arrest of a group of Indigenous Peoples, mostly women and children, by the US Border Patrol on an Indian Nation.
"We saw it all firsthand in America," said Bill Means, Lakota and cofounder of the International Indian Treaty Council on Nov. 8, when an Indigenous delegation went to the US/Mexico border here, south of Sells, to document human rights abuses for a report to the United Nations.
"Now we are going to take this wall down," Means said, after viewing the construction of a border vehicle barrier by contractors and National Guard on Tohono O'odham land.
Speaking a few hours later to the Indigenous Peoples Border Summit of the Americas II in San Xavier, Means called for solidarity of Indigenous Peoples throughout the world to halt the arrests of Indigenous Peoples who are walking north in search of a better life, and solidarity to bring down the US/Mexico border wall.
"One inch of intrusion into our land is not acceptable!" Mohawk Mark Maracle told the Border Summit. "I became very angry when I saw those guys rounding up our people.
"It is a violation of our Great Law to witness what we did today and do nothing about it."

Appeals Court Blocks Trump's Border Wall in Arizona and New Mexico in National Emergency Challenge

Our friend the Sonoran Pronghorn on the
Arizona Border, whose migration route is now targeted by Trump's Border Wall.
The real national emergency is that the homeland of Indigenous People and wildlife is threatened by a xenophobic president. -- Censored News

July 3, 2019

CONTACT: Virginia Cramer
virginia.cramer@sierraclub.org
CourtneyBourgoin
courtney.bourgoin@sierraclub.org

Appeals Court Blocks Trump’s Border Wall in National Emergency Challenge

The Appeals Court decision includes halting Trump's priority plan for a border wall at Organ Pipe National Monument, near the western side of the Tohono Oodham Nation, on the Arizona border

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal appeals court today denied the government’s attempt to begin construction of President Trump’s border wall using funds unauthorized by Congress. The ruling upholds an earlier district court order that blocks the administration from building wall sections along the southern border in New Mexico and Arizona using illegally diverted military funds.

Trump's Ecocide and Genocide: Killing Life at the Border, Killing Children in Death Camps

Trump's Ecocide and Genocide: Killing Life at the Border, Killing Children in Death Camps

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News

The US border wall construction is already destroying habitat, the wild places of animals, birds and pollinators, along the Rio Grande in Texas.
Any day now, construction will begin on the Arizona border, blocking the migration of the Pronghorn Antelope and rupturing life in the fragile Sonoran Desert. The enormous lights and road construction alone will disturb the creatures of the fragile Sonoran Desert.

In Texas, people will loose their homes and farms, and the US will seize access to the water of the Rio Grande. The US will create a no-mans land, a corridor, which the US politicians can use for their corporate friends.
These small, expensive stretches of border wall will not stop immigration. It will push migrants to more deadly zones.
"The government has already demolished refuge land in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas and construction is set to begin any day. On one section of the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge, crews have used heavy construction equipment to destroy a mix of trees, including mesquite, mulberry and hackberry. Those trees protect birds during the ongoing nesting season," AP reports.
Like the death camps where Trump is caging and torturing  children to death, and the theft of migrant children for adoption and trafficking, the border wall is an act of genocide and ecocide, and the outcry should be heard around the world.
At least six children have died in Trump's death camps and cages for migrant children, and many more have been raped and sexually abused.

Read more: Border Wall Construction along Rio Grande in Texas, and Organ Pipe National Monument, at the boundary of the Tohono O'odham Nation, and Cabeza Prieta Refuge in Arizona, where the Pronghorn Antelope live:
https://www.abc15.com/news/region-central-southern-az/nogales/border-construction-planned-for-organ-pipe-monument-cabeza-prieta-refuge

When San Carlos Apaches Were Censored: When Truth was Stolen and a US Congressman Went to Prison

By Brenda Norrell 

Censored News

Today, I came across this censored article that I wrote as a staff writer for Indian Country Today 15 years ago. It was good to read the words again of Ola Cassadore Davis, San Carlos Apache, who passed to the Spirit World.
Perhaps Arizona Rep. Rick Renzi should have listened to the Apache elders when they warned him about violating what is sacred. 
Renzi was eventually sentenced to three years in prison because of his land scam involving copper mining, in which he sought to personally benefit. Renzi served two years in prison.
I always wonder, when I read these censored articles, what a difference in history these words might have made, if they had not been censored by Indian Country Today. 

After I was censored for years, and terminated with no cause given, I published this article below in 2006, on a free website that led to Censored News as it is today.
In the late 1990s, Indian Country Today was sold by Lakota publisher Tim Giago to the Oneida Nation in New York.

There was a series of non-Indian editors, and many vital articles were censored. Specifically I was told verbally and in writing to stop writing about "grassroots" Native people. Many staff reporters, including myself, were forced into enormous debt because of expenses. Another reporter sued over this and received a settlement.

To the public, to the people, it was another kind of debt, the truth was stolen and it is owed to them. Today the newspaper is owned by the National Congress of American Indians. Time will tell if it lives up to its responsibility for truth telling and avoids the popular plagiarism of stay-at-home writers, profiteering from the hard work of journalists.

Before the newspaper was sold, during the 1990s, while publisher Tim Giago owned it, we were able to cover news in a way it was never covered. I was able to join the Zapatistas in the jungle in the beginning of the movement and be present at Big Mountain, San Carlos Apache Nation and across the west.
During those years, I talked with great icons like Buffy Sainte Marie, Russell Means, Floyd Westerman, John Trudell, Thomas Banyacya, Dan Evehema, Hopi elder who was 107, and more elders now in the Spirit World.

When Indian Country Today began in the mid 1990s, we had incredible editors, including Avis Little Eagle , now publisher of Teton Times in Standing Rock, and Monte Ecoffey of Wounded Knee, who died too young. The great photographer Larry Gus, Hopi, was also on staff in the Southwest office. Larry joined the Indigenous delegation to Chiapas, and that is how we met our lifelong friends, including Jose Matus, Yaqui Ceremonial Leader, who later passed to the Spirit World.
The newspaper fired me the day before the Indigenous Peoples Border Summit in 2006, as I got off the plane for it. I covered it anyway.

The Mohawks came from the north in 2006, and again for the border summit in 2007.
When the Mohawks saw the US Border Patrol on the Tohono O'odham Nation, arresting Indigenous women and children, the Mohawks sprang out of their cars without a moment's hesitation, and ran to their rescue.
The US Border Patrol forced the migrants into the back of the truck, as if they were cattle, and sped away. These pitiful tiny people, women and children, appeared to have walked from Guatemala.
That day I learned how Mohawks respond to this horrible abuse of human life and human dignity at the border.

That day we also saw the chained link fence cage where migrants were held by the US Border Patrol, on the sovereign Tohono O'odham Nation, outside in life threatening heat. 
Lenny Foster, Dine', called it nothing more than a "dog's cage." Next to the cage, south of Sells, was a US spy tower, in 2007, on the Tohono O'odham Nation.
Mohawks asked how the Tohono O'odham Nation could permit this to happen on their land.

Today, the US Border Patrol agents continue their abuse and assaults on both O'odham and migrants. Many migrants are Indigenous people and have walked across countries in their desperation to survive.
During this time of censorship, when US bombs fell on Baghdad, Louise Benally of Big Mountain compared the US oppression to when Dine' were forced on the cruel Longest Walk and their imprisonment at Bosque Redondo, New Mexico. Dine' suffered from starvation and many died along the way and at the barren prison 

Louise was censored by Indian Country Today, as was Bahe Katennay of Big Mountain when he spoke of oil and gas drilling in Dinetah, the Place of Origin. Lenny Foster, Dine', was censored when he described the treatment of Leonard Peltier in prison.
During these years, truth had a friend reporting at the Hague. Paul Rafferty published these censored articles in his UN Report. Paul was among the first to publish the photos of US soldiers torturing prisoners at Abu Ghraib.
While Congressman Renzi went to prison, others did not. Those responsible for desecrating Mount Graham with telescopes included the University of Arizona in Tucson and the Pope, who led the push for this desecration.

Today, San Carlos Apaches continue to battle mining, desecration at Oak Flat, and continue to protect their land and water.
Today, to the south at the border, dozens of federal laws have been waived, as Trump begins the destruction of the fragile Sonoran Desert for his border wall, which will destroy the habitat of all living things, bulldoze Native American graves, and create a no-man's corridor -- of land seized from the poor -- for the private corporations who fund politicians.
Below are the censored words of San Carlos Apache.

CENSORED in 2004: Apache protest Rep Renzi

Apaches protest Congressional hearing to dilute environmental laws
Congressmen want to bypass environmental protection laws

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News
SAFFORD, Ariz. – San Carlos Apache protested outside a Congressional field hearing and accused Congressman Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., of attempting to water down environmental protection laws aimed at protecting the red squirrel and other species in the fragile environment of sacred Mount Graham.
Ola Cassadore Davis, chair of the Apache Survival Coalition, said Renzi was promoting unprincipled developers like the University of Arizona astronomers, at the expense of Apache religious life and Apache family values.
Davis criticized Renzi’s efforts to remove endangered species protections from the Mount Graham Red Squirrel and to thin and clear-cut the summit forest surrounding the Mount Graham International Observatory. The University of Arizona's $120 million Large Binocular Telescope is nearing completion, despite Apache protests and lawsuits.
“How would Congressman Renzi like to have the hair on the top of his head thinned and parts of his hair chopped out. That’s a pretty sacred place to him, I would guess. But he disrespects places that are sacred to us,” Davis said.
“Renzi should see the fire on top of Mount Graham in July as a warning from God,” she said, referring to the summer wild fires on Mount Graham caused by lightning.
Renzi and U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., are promoting the Mount Graham Sky Island Demonstration Project, which would allow tree thinning on about 2,000 acres on the mountain. The Congressmen said the aim is to protect 21 areas on the mountain from wildfires.
However, the proposal would exempt the project from the required environmental-impact statement, which Renzi and others have said is overly time-consuming.
Federal lawmakers held a formal hearing on the Endangered Species Act Endangered Species Act in Thatcher on Sept. 20. Members of the House Resources Committee said they would accept testimony only from subpoenaed individuals at Eastern Arizona College.
Renzi claimed environmental protection laws prevented forest thinning and contributed to the Nuttall and Gibson fires, charring 29,400 acres last summer.
Davis, however, said the wildfires are being used as a ploy by the Congressmen and greedy developers to washout environmental laws.
“Congressmen like Renzi would sacrifice sacred places in order that developers can destroy the forests, rivers, mountains and special places of this country. The reason our endangered fish and wildlife animals are now endangered is because unscrupulous developers backed by people like Renzi.”
Davis, among the Apaches making statements to protest, said they should look at the Earth to see what is happening.
“Renzi and the astronomers on Mt. Graham look up at the stars, but they don’t look down at their feet to see what they have destroyed on the earth beneath them.”
Raleigh Thompson, retired San Carlos Apache Tribal Council member, said it demonstrates how Congressmen serve the rich and powerful.
“As long as Congressmen like Renzi are around to serve rich and powerful developers by attacking the country’s cultural and environmental protection laws, endangered species problems will continue.
“How would Renzi like us to go to his Church and set up a rodeo or casino beside it or put an Indian crafts shop on top of his Church’s high altar? What he is doing to our mountain and its endangered red squirrel is no different.
“This disregard for people and animals is the way the white man has treated Indians since the 19th century.”
Thompson said Dzil Nchaa Si An (Mt. Graham) has been part of Apache tribal homeland for centuries.
“It was also part of the original reservation land given to us in 1871. But when early settlers and squatters came into our rich lands, they convinced the federal government to take Dzil Nchaa Si An away from us. They wanted it for its water, lumber and other resources.
“They took our fertile Gila River valley from us too, a place where the reports of the early federal Indian Agents said we grew corn and other crops for as far ‘as the eye could see.’ Congressmen just like Renzi have since 1871, on five separate occasions, dismembered about two-thirds of our original Apache reservation’s acreage.
“No wonder we are poor. They stole the best parts of our land. Congressmen like Renzi don’t care if we go extinct any more than they care if the Mount Graham Red Squirrel goes extinct.”
San Carlos Apache elder Erwin Rope said projects such as these get approval because they promise jobs, which never arrive.
“While the $200,000,000 taxpayer financed telescope project creates some temporary jobs, it creates very few permanent jobs,” Rope said.
Rope pointed out that according to the official Forest Service’s Arizona Department of Transportation studies, the most jobs created would be 33 in Tucson and 30 in Safford.
“That is an extremely inefficient and wasteful way for anybody to help local communities,” he said.
Mike Davis, Apache Survival Coalition member and American Indian, said Apaches must speak up to protect the small creatures.
“We Indians respect and honor the intent of our Great Spirit, -- for animals to live on this planet. It is wrong to abandon endangered animals that need our help as desperately as the Mount Graham Red Squirrel.”
Ola Cassadore Davis pointed out that Mount Graham has more vegetation life zones than any other mountain in North America, and that the forest at the summit is the southernmost spruce-fir forest in North America.
“We Apache also know this place is unique. It has been spiritually a part of us for centuries. But people like Renzi don’t care about anything except the money that can be made from those places.
“Look at the severely endangered animal like the Mount Graham Red Squirrel, now down to just a few hundred individuals before the recent fire.”
Apache protesters, which included elderly, said it was inappropriate for police to watch over their protest at the hearing with a police attack dog.
Davis said the Congressmen want to make the living creatures go extinct so the University of Arizona can build a city of telescopes on the mountain.
“If it hadn’t been for the squirrel, the University of Arizona would have by now built a city of telescopes all over the summit of this sacred mountain.”
The League of Conservation Voters recently named Renzi to its "dirty dozen" list of lawmakers which the group considers to have anti-environmental voting records.

Article copyright Brenda Norrell. May not be used without permission.

About the author

Brenda Norrell began as a news reporter at Navajo Times during the 18 years that she lived on the Navajo Nation. She was a stringer for the Associated Press, USA Today, and other national publications before becoming a staff writer for Indian Country Today. She created Censored News as a result of the censorship at Indian Country Today. Censored News is in its 13th year with 19 million pageviews. It has no ads, grants or revenues.

Militarization at Standing Rock and Border: Native Women Testifying at Hearing Targeted by U.S.

Ofelia Rivas with Govinda Dalton Sunday. Photo Brenda Norrell.

Native American Women Testifying in Jamaica Targeted by U.S. during Re-Entry into United States

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News
May 12, 2019
French translation by Christine Prat

TUCSON -- The militarization at Standing Rock was no different than the militarization at the border on Tohono O'odham  Nation land.
"They want to try and treat us like we are not human beings," Ofelia Rivas, Tohono O'odham, said on Sunday afternoon.

Rivas, returning from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights hearing in Jamaica, described the harassment and profiling she received after testifying.
After the hearing in Jamaica on Friday, Rivas was targeted and delayed for two days, after an "SSSS" label was placed on her ticket in Jamaica.
Tagged for constant searches, delays, and harassment in Jamaica, Miami and Dallas, Rivas said it is the same profiling, targeting and mistreatment she and other O'odham receive on a daily basis at the U.S. Mexico border in their homeland.
The extreme abuse caused her and another Native woman who testified in Jamaica, to miss their flights.
The journey back to Arizona from Jamaica, which should have taken hours in flying time, took two days.
Rivas was tagged with "SSSS" on her ticket, a tactic by the United States government that is becoming common place for Indigenous human rights activists.
Beyond Tucson, Rivas has to endure the U.S. security checkpoints. Often there are more delays, especially for Rivas and others who speak O'odham. They are often placed in secondary screening by U.S. Border Patrol agents.
During an interview with Govinda Dalton at Earthcycles on Sunday afternoon, Rivas described the 500 years of genocidal practices, which continue today. Rivas said the U.S. Border Patrol, under Homeland Security, has attempted to oppress the people.
At the Human Rights Hearing in Jamaica, Rivas said her purpose was to describe the militarization and the attempt to dehumanize human beings carried out by the United States government.
Rivas was in a delegation of Native American women who testified on the criminalization of Native people.
Testifying in Jamaica on Thursday were Michelle Cook, Dine', Leoyla Cowboy, Dine', and Casey Camp Horinek, Ponca. They told of the abuse by police at Standing Rock, and those now suffering and abused for protecting the water.
"My focus there was the mindset of the United States government," Rivas said, describing the racism toward people of color in the United States.
"We are under surveillance all the time."
"These inhumane policies mean we are not treated equally as human beings."
Rivas said "heavily armed military interrogate our elders" and they do not speak English or Spanish. They speak O'odham.
The new integrated fixed towers have been approved by the Tohono O'odham Nation, Rivas said.
The company, Elbit Systems of Israel, is the same company that oppresses the people of Palestine.
Rivas said the targeting and delays getting home are the harassment that Palestinians and Indigenous are enduring around the world.
"I endured two days, trying to get home, and I'm not home yet."
"We have survived 500 years of this type of attack on our lives."
"We will survive these attacks."
"I feel that what has happened in Standing Rock has opened the eyes of the world to the genocidal policies that the United States has, in what they call the greatest country in the world."
"It only applies to certain people, and certainly not to me."
The egregious attitude of the United States toward Indigenous Peoples human rights was obvious at the hearing, when the U.S. showed no respect to the Commissioners.
Rivas pointed out that during the hearing, the US delegation from the United States Embassy and State Department, told the Commission that it was "incompetent" and that the U.S. does not have to comply with these laws -- laws that  govern the whole world, Rivas said.
"I hope that I am able to speak on the behalf of all the animals and plants and the people that do not have a voice."

Rivas said corporations fund the deep pockets and make an impact on every aspect of our lives.
When the Tohono O'odham Nation approved the integrated fixed towers, (known as spy towers) they did not think of the impact on the natural world, she said.
They didn't think about the bees, how they pollinate the plants, or the future generations of children, she said.
Although the United States attempts to convince people that terrorists may enter from the southern border.
Rivas said investigations prove otherwise.
"We don't believe that garbage."
At the hearing in Jamaica, Mexico told of the missing Indigenous women and children.
She said this is happening to Indigenous women and children around the world.

Censored News has daily live coverage of the hearing, May 8 -- 10, 2019.

Please support Ofelia Rivas work:
Ofelia needs new tires to continue her work, including taking O'odham elders to meetings.
Donations can be sent to:
Ofelia Rivas
PO Box 1835
Sells, Arizona 85634



The following article is from 2015, but the spy towers are still planned.
.

Breaking News Exclusive!

US Israeli spy tower pact targets Tohono O'odham sacred mountain and spying on traditional O'odham

By Brenda Norrell

copyright Censored News 
French translation by Christine Prat
http://www.chrisp.lautre.net/wpblog/?p=3140

GU-VO, Tohono O'odham Nation -- The US has targeted two traditional Tohono O'odham districts, Gu-Vo District and Chukut Kuk District, with 15 new US spy towers built by the Israeli Apartheid corporation Elbit Systems, responsible for Apartheid security surrounding Palestine.

On Tohono O'odham land, the US conceals the fact the US Homeland Security gave the spy towers contract to the Israeli corporation Elbit Systems, responsible for the Apartheid security surrounding Palestine and a manufacturer of drones.

The Gu-Vo District opposes this proposal. Gu-Vo is in the western most district of the Tohono O'odham Nation.

The Gu-Vo District said in a statement, "The Gu-Vo District opposes these proposed tower sites to protect cultural sites on the holy mountain now called the Ajo Mountain Range. The mountain holds human remains of our people and also places of our cultural practices (medicine bundles) home and home of the ceremonial deer and bighorn sheep and mountain tortoises that are protected under the Endangered Species Act."

"The United States government military forces, the border patrol, have not been forthcoming with impact information, such as health effects and have deliberately misinformed the people regarding the immediate environmental impacts such as the roads they will build on the mountain and installation of electrical power lines to the sites as well as that these proposed tower sites will have a 25-year or longer impact on the mountain, the animal and plant life and

Tohono O'odham 1916

the O'odham lives."

"The Gu-Vo District communities landscape have already been greatly impacted by numerous unauthorized roads and destruction of our mountains and hills of great significance to the O'odham way of life. Our future generations will face more restriction to live on our original lands as our rights as original Indigenous peoples continue to deteriorate."

"These U.S. proposed towers also are not on the border but in our communities and on the border of the Tohono O'odham Nation reiterating discrimination and deliberate attack on the O'odham," said Gu-Vo District.

While the US attempts to conceal who this contract has been granted to, the US border contract was celebrated in Israel.

Last year US Homeland Security gave the $145 million Integrated Fixed Tower to Elbit Systems, an Israeli defense contractor, instead of to a US corporation. Prior to this contract, Boeing spent $1 billion attempting to build spy towers before announcing that its spy towers on the Arizona border did not work.

US Border Patrol with spy cameras pointed into the home
of a traditional O'odham woman

The Israeli spy towers are the latest attack on the traditional O’odham, and a means of surveillance and oppression, for O'odham who live in their sovereign homeland.

The increase of US and Israeli militarization on sovereign Tohono O'odham land has resulted in widespread human rights abuses, including rapes and murders carried out by US Border Patrol agents. 

US Border Patrol agents have been arrested and convicted in every region of the US border for running drugs. A Congressional hearing revealed that hundreds of US Border Patrol and ICE agents have been arrested and convicted of drug smuggling and serving as "spotters." Spotters are look-outs for the Mexican cartels and provide safe passage for the cartels to transport large loads of drugs into the US. 

The US government has armed the Mexican cartels since 2005 by way of the US ATF's Project Gunrunner, Wide Receiver and Fast and Furious. The US media has failed to expose how US agents are involved in drug smuggling at the southern border. The US uses the excuse of this so-called war on drugs in an attempt to justify these US Israeli spy towers, which violate all laws of privacy and human rights in the US.

Meanwhile, universities have partnered with Israel to target Indigenous Peoples in the creation of drones and surveillance. 

The University of Arizona in Tucson is boycotted by O'odham human rights activists for designing drones and border surveillance which target and kill Indigenous Peoples globally. San Carlos Apache also boycott the University of Arizona for taking the lead, with the Pope, in placing massive telescopes on sacred Mount Graham in Arizona.

Above: US spy tower near Sells, Arizona, on the sovereign Tohono O'odham Nation, viewed with outrage by a delegation of Mohawks, Lakota, Dine' and Pueblo during the Indigenous Border Summit of the Americas in 2007. The spy tower was located next to the "cage," constructed of a metal fence and concrete floor where migrants were detained, including Indigenous Peoples from Mexico and Central America, walking and hoping for a better life. Large numbers of Indigenous Peoples have died on the Tohono O'odham Nation of thirst and dehydration. The Tohono O'odham Nation created a law which made it a crime to give a drink of water, or aid, to migrants. This law was opposed by Tohono O'odham human rights activists who say they have been instructed by their ancestors to carry out a spiritual way of life for all of creation, the Himdaag way of life.
.

Below is the current proposal of Aug. 2015:

In the news:
Reuters: US Homeland Security awards contract to Elbit:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/02/us-elbitsystems-arizona-contract-idUSBREA2104K20140302

Epoch Times: During the Congressional hearing on border agent crime, the US admitted that since 2004, over 130 agents of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) have been arrested, charged, or otherwise prosecuted on corruption charges. The convictions include alien and drug smuggling, money laundering, and conspiracy.  
http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/united-states/congressional-hearing-examines-ethics-violations-at-dhs-242766.html

Israeli newspaper Haaretz: State of Arizona used Elbit drones on Arizona border in 2004:
http://www.haaretz.com/news/israeli-drones-used-by-arizona-border-police-1.136572

Background:
The IFT systems will consist of surveillance equipment (e.g., ground surveillance radars and surveillance cameras) mounted on fixed (i.e., stationary) tower(s); all necessary power generation and communications equipment to support these tower sites; and command and control (C2) center equipment (including one or more operator workstations) that are capable of displaying information received from surveillance towers on a common operating picture (COP), based on current BP AoRs.

copyright, Brenda Norrell, Censored News
For permission to republish: brendanorrell@gmail.com

Please share our link to this article:
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2015/09/us-israeli-pact-targets-traditional.html

Copyright Ofelia Rivas, Brenda Norrell, Govinda Dalton. No portion may be used without permission.

U.S. Spy Trucks Target Indigenous on Border. Border Patrol Should Turn Cameras on Itself.

(Above photo by Lori Simmons)
Spy truck now on Texas border where Indigenous Peoples are defending a burial place and the National Butterfly Center from the border wall being pushed by the Ultra White Supremacist placed in the presidency.

U.S. Spy Trucks Target Indigenous on Border. U.S. Border Patrol Should Turn Cameras on Itself.

By Brenda Norrell

Censored News

The US Border Patrol should turn its cameras on itself. An agent was recently arrested smuggling drugs on to the Tohono O'odham Nation at Sasabe, Arizona.

 Instead the United States spies on Native people all along the border. The video spy camera trucks shown here target Indigenous People.
In the photo above, this spy truck is at McAllen, Texas, in the area where Native people are resisting the border wall, and defending the National Butterfly Center.
Below you can see one of the United Stares' spy trucks --  on Tohono O'odham Nation sovereign land -- spying into a traditional O'odham woman's home.

One Border Patrol agent on Tohono O'odham Nation has been identified as a US Border Patrol agent in Special Operations, special ops, based in El Paso. The agent pulled a gun on an O'odham woman when she told him to leave.
Along with the mobil U.S. spy trucks, now Israeli spy towers are planned by U.S. Homeland Security for sovereign Tohono O'odham Nation land. Gu-Vo District is opposing the towers which would destroy burial places and endanger the fragile desert and wildlife.
The U.S. contract is with Elbit Systems, an Israeli defense contractor responsible for Apartheid border security in Palestine, and known around the world for human rights violations.

https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2015/09/us-israeli-pact-targets-traditional.html?m=1&fbclid=IwAR0cZhD7_Gw9Zpan6BJRo2-Hn1vlcydoHhd2g6PzfLyebEbSywQ0VYNV_U0-

Article copyright Brenda Norrell. Photos copyright by photographers, names withheld here.