#OccupyStateDept - approximately 4 am (Photo Credit: Josh Lopez)
Late Thursday night close to 50 people descended on the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington, DC. We were there for one reason: #OccupyStateDept.
It was the eve of the final State Department public hearing on the proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, and news was breaking about the corrosive influence that big oil and TransCanada were having on the State Department's deliberative process. We had heard reports from other hearings across the country that big corporations and their front groups were bussing in people, paying line-sitters, and skirting the rules to try to dominate the hearing process.
It was clear that Big Oil was once again going to try to flood the political process, using their financial muscle to drown out the voices of people across the country who oppose this disastrous pipeline. So we decided if Big Oil was going to try to flood this process, we would occupy it.
