Minnesota environmentalist group uses huge RV to protest oil industry

Class A motorhomes like the one at the protest get about 10 miles to the gallon and hold up to 150 gallons of fuel.

Honor the Earth/Facebook

A group of Minnesota environmentalists turned out to protest the Line 3 pipeline using a massive motorhome Tuesday.

Honor the Earth and its sister organization Stop Line 3 again voiced their opposition to the project outside an Enbridge office in Park Rapids, Minnesota. The group projected images of bloody handprints onto the office and held signs sporting the stopline3.org URL.

They also brought a much larger sign advertising their website plastered onto the side of what appears to be a Monaco Coach motorhome. Class A motorhomes like the one at the protest get about 10 miles to the gallon and hold up to 150 gallons of fuel.

“Home Team can [sic] out in Park Rapids,” Honor the Earth wrote below its photo of the RV on Instagram.

Alpha News reached out to Honor the Earth to ask if it owns the motorhome and how it reconciles its green values with the use of such an inefficient vehicle. The group did not immediately respond to comment.

The protesters projected bloody handprints and the Stop Line 3 logo onto the Enbridge facility. (Instagram/Honor the Earth)

This is not the first Park Rapids protest. Honor the Earth, led personally by Executive Director Winona LaDuke, picketed in the town in December 2020. At that time, protesters said they’d continue to turn out weekly unless construction of the pipeline is discontinued, reports the Duluth News Tribune.

This is also not the first time Minnesota environmentalists have used petroleum-powered vehicles to take a stand against the oil industry. Another group of so-called “water protectors” took to the streets in their SUVs, driving in a caravan to protest Line 3 last month.

Honor the Earth has led a broad coalition of activists in a renewed charge to prevent Enbridge from building the Line 3 oil pipeline replacement since the company broke ground late last year. The activist group opposes the project because it supports the oil industry and allegedly violates native land rights.

Meanwhile, supporters of the project and the state of Minnesota say the Obama-mandated line is critical to replace dangerous, aging infrastructure. The Fond Du Lac band of Lake Superior Chippewa have also reached a deal that allows them to profit from the line’s use of native land, per MPR.

 

Kyle Hooten

Kyle Hooten is Managing Editor of Alpha News. His coverage of Minneapolis has been featured on television shows like Tucker Carlson Tonight and in print media outlets like the Wall Street Journal.