Allison Geyer
Adam Mead Faletti has spent the past 10 days in Madison recuperating from his time spent protesting against the Dakota Access pipeline near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota.
In two months there, Faletti endured not just severe cold and snow, but rubber bullets, tear gas and water blasts in sub-freezing temperatures administered by police trying to break up the demonstrations, which protesters call “actions.” Although the activists relished a hard-fought victory on Dec. 4, when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers denied a crucial permit for the Dakota Access Pipeline, Faletti warns against complacency after the order to halt pipeline construction.
“People cheered, but for all of us who live at Standing Rock, this was business as usual,” he says. “We knew not to celebrate, because [the stop work order] can be broken — just like the treaties were broken.”
Faletti is a former Hollywood art director who abandoned his career in the entertainment business to help found the People’s Project, a group whose members travel the country via bus caravan promoting sustainable housing and other progressive causes. Speaking to Isthmus at a coffee shop in Madison, Faletti had a cough and and visibly damaged teeth — injuries he claims to have suffered at the hands of police. He’s part of a class-action lawsuit alleging that the Morton County Sheriff’s Department used excessive force against demonstrators.
While at Standing Rock, Faletti met and befriended Airto Castaneda-Cudney, who was one of the Madison residents featured in a recent Isthmus cover story on Standing Rock. Castaneda-Cudney has made three trips to the protest site since October. But his most recent visit was perhaps the most eventful. He arrived at camp Dec. 4 along with more than 2,000 military veterans who “self-deployed” to stand in solidarity with the anti-pipeline protesters; those opposed to the pipeline call themselves “water protectors” in reference to the potential danger the underground pipeline poses to Lake Oahe, the main drinking water source for the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation.
Like Faletti, Castaneda-Cudney expressed cautious optimism about the order to stop the pipeline construction. “People got excited, but some of us didn’t believe the drilling would actually stop,” he says. “We realized [the announcement] was a tactic to get us to calm down.”
The veterans’ action was scheduled for Dec. 5, the same day federal officials had ordered those living at Oceti Sakowin camp to disband and relocate to a “free speech zone” south of the Cannonball River. Other authorities, including North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple, had ordered an “emergency evacuation” of the protest camps, citing safety concerns from harsh weather. Protesters defied the orders, with many pledging to stay camped until the pipeline is defeated. Other supporters coordinated to bring provisions to the camp to help the effort.
“When we got there on Sunday afternoon, there was a line of cars past the Cannonball River to the entrance of Oceti Sakowin, just waiting to dump supplies,” he says. “There were at least 5,000 people surrounding the camp.”
Ron Arm, a Vietnam War veteran from Madison, caravanned out to Standing Rock with activist friends from Veterans for Peace and other groups. His group also arrived at Oceti Sakowin camp on Dec. 4, pulling in just as news broke that work on the pipeline would be suspended. As the caravan neared camp, traffic slowed down and horns started blaring; people from camp came running out to greet the vehicles and share the good news.
“We are joyous and happy, this is a victory, but this is a battle won — this is not a war won,” Arm says. “This is something that we must persist with.”
After the announcement, Standing Rock Sioux Chairman Dave Archambault II asked people to leave the encampments, telling Reuters that “nothing will happen” over winter until President-elect Donald Trump takes office on Jan. 20. "The current administration did the right thing and we need to educate the incoming administration and help them understand the right decision was made," Archambault said.
The next day a massive blizzard hit Standing Rock, dumping snow on the encampment and closing roads leading to the protest site, trapping people who were attempting to leave. Arm was stuck along with more than 1,000 others at the Prairie Knights Casino in nearby Fort Yates, where people from the Standing Rock camps huddled for shelter during the storm.
There were no reported deaths, but camp medics were dealing with “a lot of hypothermia,” Castaneda-Cudney says. The storm dumped more than two feet of snow on the area and flattened the once-sprawling village of summerweight tents; the only structures left standing are teepees, RVs and military tents.
By the time Castaneda-Cudney and his friends left Standing Rock Dec. 6, the gas station nearest to the encampment had run out of regular and midgrade gasoline. They filled up their vehicle with premium and set out for what, in normal conditions, should have been a 13-hour drive back to Madison. The journey ended up taking well over two days.
“We got stuck in two snowbanks, almost crashed, and had to get towed out,” he says. “It was bad, really bad.”
