Peter Dykstra: Southern Discomfort
HELLO CHICAGO/flickr

Peter Dykstra: Southern Discomfort

If environmental advocates really expect a seismic shift in party sympathies in the midterm elections, they'd do well to look away, look away from Dixieland. It's a mess.

ATLANTA—In the off-year 2017 elections, Doug Jones was just the Dreamland candidate for Southern Democrats' comeback.


Relatively telegenic and a civil rights prosecutor, Jones faced the best odds an Alabama Democrat had in years: His Republican opponent, Roy Moore, had twice been bounced from the Alabama Supreme Court for ignoring Constitutional mandates. And Moore was buried in a dozen complaints that he trolled, stalked, or groped young women decades earlier.

Although Moore denied all accusations, his campaign wallowed in an epic pit of creepiness.

The relatively unassailable Jones managed a 1.7 percent victory for a partial-term Senate seat he'll be hard-pressed to keep in 2020.

One-point-seven percent, over a guy dragging credible child molestation charges to the polls. That may well be the pinnacle of the Democrats' revival in the Confederate states. Trumpian rhetoric on immigration and re-ignition of controversies over Civil War statues and symbols poll well here, thrusting hot-button issues from the 20th and 19th Centuries into a 21st Century template.

And Jones isn't alone. There are few races in the South that offer any hope of flipping either US chamber away from anti-environmental regulatory rollback agendas, or appointments of anti-regulatory judges.

In Tennessee, Rep. Marsha Blackburn stands a good chance of succeeding retiring fellow Republican Senator Bob Corker. Blackburn's green credentials include a fierce fight against energy-saving compact fluorescent lightbulbs as well as a fierce fight for climate denial.

A few other hardcore climate deniers are quitting, but their seats are a virtual lock to stay in GOP hands. Rep. "Smoky Joe" Barton was the guy who offered a House Floor apology to BP after what he saw as rough treatment by the Obama Administration following BP's 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

And fellow Texan Lamar Smith turned his Chairmanship of the House Science Committee into a years-long inquisition into climate science. Their departures will impact climate denial seniority, but not climate denial numbers.

Many environmental advocates are banking on the uphill battle of Stacey Abrams, former Georgia House Minority Leader, to defeat Secretary of State Brian Kemp. Incumbent Florida Senator Bill Nelson may be fiercely challenged by Tea Party Governor Rick Scott, who currently has a slim polling lead. A Scott victory could nullify any Democratic hopes for a US Senate takeover.

And continued GOP control over statehouses and legislatures could stop clean energy's advance in its tracks down here.

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In short:

  • The tribes oppose Enbridge’s Line 5 tunnel project, which would replace part of a 72-year-old pipeline under the Straits of Mackinac, a critical freshwater corridor between Lake Michigan and Lake Huron.
  • Their withdrawal follows the Army Corps of Engineers’ move to fast-track permitting under President Trump’s energy emergency order, which tribes say dismisses their environmental and legal concerns.
  • Tribal leaders and legal advocates argue that the project threatens water resources and violates both U.S. treaty obligations and international law requiring Indigenous consent.

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“Tribal Nations are no longer willing to expend their time and resources as Cooperating Agencies just so their participation may be used by the Corps to lend credibility to a flawed [Environmental Impact Statement] process and document.”

— Letter from seven Indigenous nations to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

Why this matters:

Buried beneath the Straits of Mackinac, where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron converge, Line 5 has become a flashpoint in the battle over fossil fuel infrastructure, Indigenous sovereignty, and environmental protection. The aging oil and gas pipeline — operated by Canadian energy giant Enbridge — moves millions of gallons of crude and natural gas liquids daily through a region that holds 20% of the planet’s surface freshwater. A proposed tunnel to house a replacement segment beneath the lakebed has drawn fierce opposition from tribal nations, who warn it risks catastrophic spills and continued desecration of sacred territory.

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