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Judge stops enforcement of laws limiting protests of Keystone XL pipeline

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Judge stops enforcement of laws limiting protests of Keystone XL pipeline

A judge prevented South Dakota from putting into effect the largest parts of new state laws designed to protect TC Energy Corp.'s Keystone XL oil pipeline and other pipeline projects from protests that could disrupt construction.

In a Sept. 18 order, U.S. District Judge Lawrence Piersol granted most of a request for a preliminary injunction filed by the nonprofit organization American Civil Liberties Union, which said the laws threatened freedom of speech and the right to protest. The judge made an exception for enforcement of part of a law that makes people responsible for "riot boosting" if they encourage violence.

The judge said the state's anti-riot-boosting statutes would have held liable Martin Luther King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference if the laws were in place during their protests in Alabama. (U.S. District Court for the District of South Dakota, Western Division, docket CIV 19-5026)

On March 5, South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem introduced the legislation to recover the cost of policing and cleaning up protests similar to those staged against the Dakota Access pipeline in 2016 that blocked construction for months. The Dakota Access protest and related clashes between protesters and police resulted in injuries, arrests, damage to construction equipment and costs to government agencies. The governor said the new laws would penalize those who tried to turn peaceful protest into riots.

The Keystone XL pipeline would run about 1,200 miles to link the oil sands region of western Canada with a pipeline hub in Nebraska. The project is designed to carry as much oil as 830,000 barrels per day from the oil sands and from the western edge of the Bakken formation, which straddles the Montana-North Dakota border. A cross-border permit was rejected by the Obama administration but revived by President Donald Trump.