Why is Biden All-In on the Line 3 Pipeline?

Any good will Biden got from environmentalists for the end of the Keystone XL Pipeline is disappearing very fast because he is supporting the Line 3 Pipeline, which is just bad, which also goes across Native lands, and which is counter to the energy policies we desperately need to avoid the entire world becoming what Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia have become this week.

The Biden administration has defended a contentious pipeline project that would carry hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil through Minnesota’s delicate watersheds, urging in a court brief that a challenge brought by local tribes and environmental groups be thrown out.

The closely watched filing in federal court was the latest in a series of actions taken by the administration toback Trump-era approvalsof oil and gas infrastructure, despite President Biden’s pledge to aggressively cut emissions from fossil fuels, a major driver of climate change. The pipeline, which is known as Line 3 and is being built by Canadian pipeline company Enbridge Energy, has been the focus of mass protests in recent weeks.

Mr. Biden could still decide to withdraw the federal permits that the pipeline depends upon for construction to proceed. But for now, the administration is defending a decision by the United States Army Corps of Engineers to issue those permits. That decision was made in the closing days of the Trump Administration.

The clash between Mr. Biden’s pledges on climate change and his recent decisions has disappointed those who had hoped that the United States would finally start taking aggressive steps to ward off the worst effects of global warming. It also illustrates the difficulties of weaning the country off the oil and gas that has long powered its economy.

This is both outrageous and completely unacceptable. Biden deserves protests anywhere he appears so long as this exists.