Bernie Sanders, Tammy Baldwin Join Fight To Prevent Mining Of Sacred Native American Lands
Bernie Sanders, Tammy Baldwin Join Fight To Prevent Mining Of Sacred Native American Lands
A measure selling the lands to a foreign mining company was slipped into a defense bill at the last minute.
By Samantha Lachman - 11/05/2015 03:44 PM EST
WASHINGTON -- Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) introduced a bill on Thursday that would repeal a controversial measure giving sacred Native American lands in Arizona to a foreign-owned mining company.
The measure, called the the Southeast Arizona Land Exchange and Conservation Act, was inserted into the $585 billion National Defense Authorization Act of 2015 by Republican Arizona Sens. John McCain and Jeff Flake in December.
The deal would allow a subsidiary of the mining conglomerates Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton, called Resolution Copper, to mine a massive copper deposit in Arizona's Tonto National Forest. The Apache use a section of the forest, called Oak Flat, for religious ceremonies and consider it one of their holy sites. Though the mining company has said it would work with local tribes to ensure their concerns are heard and conduct environmental analyses, the Apache say digging a massive mine under their ancestral lands will inevitably damage sacred ceremonial and burial grounds.
The bill, which is also sponsored by Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), would repeal the land exchange. Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) introduced the same bill in the House earlier this year and had been looking for a senator to sponsor the bill in the upper chamber...
Full article:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-native-americans_563b9e9de4b0411d30700508
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