The Department of Justice has weighed in on a court battle over an oil and gas pipeline in Wisconsin, saying that a Canadian oil company has been willfully trespassing on tribal lands in the state for more than a decade.
On Wednesday, lawyers for the Justice Department filed a brief saying that the company, Enbridge, “lacks any legal right to remain” on the land, part of a reservation of the Bad River Band, an Ojibwe group.
But the brief largely sidestepped the question of whether a 1970s treaty between the United States and Canada gives Enbridge the right to operate the pipeline indefinitely, as the company asserts.
Enbridge is fighting demands by state, tribal and judicial authorities to shut down the pipeline known as Line 5, which crosses 645 miles of Wisconsin and Michigan, in lawsuits pending in federal appellate court in each state.
Environmentalists in both states have raised concerns about the deteriorating condition of Line 5 and the company’s proposals to shore it up.
Persons:
Enbridge
Organizations:
of Justice, Justice Department
Locations:
Wisconsin, Canadian, United States, Canada, Michigan