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For Immediate Release
March, 25 2021, 12:00am EDT
Contact:
Collin Rees, Oil Change U.S., collin@priceofoil.org, 308-293-3159
Brett Hartl, Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund, bretthartl@centeractionfund.org, 202-817-8121
Sam Bernhardt, Food & Water Action, sbernhardt@fwwatch.org, 267-428-1903
Alan Minsky, Progressive Democrats of America, alan@pdamerica.org, 818-749-9497
Zanagee Artis, Zero Hour, zanagee@thisiszerohour.org, 860-575-7535
Five National Groups Announce Endorsement of State Sen. Antoinette Sedillo Lopez in NM-01
Today, five national environmental and progressive groups representing tens of thousands of New Mexico voters announced their endorsement of State Senator Antoinette Sedillo Lopez for New Mexico's 1st Congressional district. The groups announcing their endorsement of Sedillo Lopez include Oil Change U.S., the Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund, Food & Water Action, Progressive Democrats of America, and Zero Hour.
Collin Rees, Senior Campaigner at Oil Change U.S., said:
WASHINGTON
Today, five national environmental and progressive groups representing tens of thousands of New Mexico voters announced their endorsement of State Senator Antoinette Sedillo Lopez for New Mexico's 1st Congressional district. The groups announcing their endorsement of Sedillo Lopez include Oil Change U.S., the Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund, Food & Water Action, Progressive Democrats of America, and Zero Hour.
Collin Rees, Senior Campaigner at Oil Change U.S., said:
"We need Antoinette Sedillo Lopez's visionary leadership in Congress. As a state senator she's been a tireless advocate for communities impacted by the fossil fuel industry's greed, rejecting industry money and working for an equitable transition beyond oil and gas. Senator Sedillo Lopez will be a worthy successor to Secretary Deb Haaland, carrying on the mantle of progressive and environmental leadership for New Mexicans."
Brett Hart, political director at the Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund, said:
"Antoinette shares Deb Haaland's environmental vision, one that puts people and our environment first. She will be a champion for wildlife, a champion for clean air and water, and a tireless advocate to save our climate from the ravages caused by the fossil fuel industry."
Wenonah Hauter, Executive Director of Food & Water Action, said:
"Senator Sedillo Lopez has demonstrated time and again a fierce advocacy for environmental justice issues and a bold willingness to stand up to the fossil fuel industry. She will bring the same tenacity and concern for her constituents in Congress as she has done for her district as a New Mexico state senator. New Mexicans need a fighter on their side who will stand up for what is right, and they've found a champion in Antoinette Sedillo Lopez."
Alan Minsky, Executive Director of Progressive Democrats of America, said:
"As she proved in the New Mexico State Senate, Antoinette Sedillo Lopez is an unwavering advocate for the people and the planet. Her policy positions -- rooted in years of advocacy work in her community, and grounded by a deep commitment to economic, environmental, and social justice -- are a template for the transformative politics we need in the 21st century. Sedillo Lopez will be an excellent successor to Deb Haaland in Congress."
Zanagee Artis, Policy Director of Zero Hour, said:
"Zero Hour knows that Senator Sedillo Lopez will carry forward a bold vision of nationwide renewable energy and an end to fossil fuel reliance as a member of Congress. Antoinette Sedillo Lopez will be a champion for young people in pushing forward the Green New Deal that New Mexicans and youth across the nation need for a livable future. Young people need her in the halls of the U.S. Congress."
Oil Change International is a research, communications, and advocacy organization focused on exposing the true costs of fossil fuels and facilitating the ongoing transition to clean energy.
(202) 518-9029LATEST NEWS
'Foreign Billionaires First, America Last': Critics Slam GOP Over Mining Approval Near Minnesota Boundary Waters
"We don’t allow mining in Yellowstone, Yosemite, Zion, Acadia, Glacier, or any of our nation’s revered national parks—and we shouldn’t allow it in the watershed of the Boundary Waters, either," said one congresswoman.
Apr 16, 2026
Democratic lawmakers and environmental protection groups condemned Senate Republicans on Thursday for their "heartbreaking" passage of a House resolution to overturn a 20-year moratorium on mining in the watershed of Minnesota's Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, the nation's most visited wilderness area—a vote that critics said was the result of years of lobbying by a foreign-owned mining firm.
House Joint Resolution 140 now heads to President Donald Trump's desk, nearly a decade after Chilean conglomerate Antofagasta, the owner of Twin Metals Minnesota, began discussing with Trump's first administration its desire to build a copper mine over the pristine area.
"Because of this extremely short-sighted vote, our nation’s most-visited wilderness area faces the threat of permanent toxic pollution," said Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.). "Why? So Antofagasta, a Chilean corporation that owns Twin Metals, can mine American copper and ship it to China to be smelted and sold on the global market. Twin Metals has been lobbying President Trump and Republicans in Congress for over ten years to remove the protections from this watershed and renew their mine plans to extract American minerals at the expense of freshwater for future generations."
The 50-49 vote in the Senate, said Environment America, puts the 1.1 million-acre wilderness area for heavy metals leaching into the soil and water through acid mine drainage.
Toxic runoff from copper mining, said the group, "ultimately poisons the land and water surrounding a mine, making the ecosystem unlivable for wildlife."
Leda Huta, vice president of government relations for American Rivers, called the vote "a betrayal of the public trust."
“We share in the deep disappointment of millions of Americans who expect our elected leaders to protect our clean water, our abundant wildlife, and access for all to unmatched outdoor recreation spaces," said Huta. "This is a heartbreaking moment.”
Amanda Hefner, manager of Save the Boundary Waters Action Fund, wrote in a column in Minnesota Reformer last October that "in a water-rich environment like the Boundary Waters, with its low buffering capacity, pollution would spread quickly through interconnected lakes and streams." She also wrote that it was "reckless" to risk the preserve's 17,000 jobs and over $1 billion in annual revenue "for a foreign-owned mine that would pollute and leave toxic waste for generations."
According to Jacobin, Antofagasta spent $200,000 on lobbying in the final quarter of 2024 and $230,000 in the first quarter of 2025 "on issues including federal leases for Twin Metals." The Chilean company is owned by billionaire Andrónico Luksic, who rented out his $5.5 million mansion in Washington, DC to Trump's daughter Ivanka and her husband, then-White House adviser Jared Kushner, from 2017-21.
The Sierra Club noted that to pass the mining ban reversal, Senate Republicans "utilized a baseless interpretation of the Congressional Review Act (CRA)."
"The CRA only allows Congress to disapprove of administrative rules," said the group. "No previous administration has considered mineral withdrawals to be 'rules' that are subject to the CRA."
Athan Manuel, director of the Sierra Club's Lands Protection Program, said that "allowing a foreign company to open a toxic mine on its doorstep puts a fragile ecosystem at risk and shows the Trump Administration will always act to benefit corporations over the American people.”
“The Boundary Waters is one of the country’s most iconic wilderness areas, visited by thousands every year. It should be a place for recreation and conservation, not for pollution and exploitation," said Manuel.
Despite Trump's refrain, "America First," Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) said the vote made clear that "for the GOP, it’s foreign billionaires first, America last."
McCollum warned that the mining moratorium was "the only way to protect this wilderness, which is home to some of the cleanest water in the entire world.
"We don’t allow mining in Yellowstone, Yosemite, Zion, Acadia, Glacier, or any of our nation’s revered national parks—and we shouldn’t allow it in the watershed of the Boundary Waters, either," said the congresswoman. "One hundred percent of copper mines have failed, leading to polluted waters. This case will be no different."
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Minnesota Prosecutors Slap ICE Agent With Two Felony Assault Charges
"Today's charges reflect an important milestone in our efforts to seek accountability for the harms inflicted on our community," said Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty.
Apr 16, 2026
Prosecutors in Minnesota charged a federal immigration enforcement agent with assault on Thursday for pulling a gun on two local residents during a February traffic dispute.
The Hennepin County prosecutor's office charged US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer Gregory Donnell Morgan Jr., a resident of Maryland, with two counts of felony assault for the incident that took place along Highway 62 on February 5.
During a press conference, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty alleged that Morgan was driving a rented, unmarked Ford Expedition illegally along the shoulder of Highway 62.
The alleged victims, objecting to Morgan illegally driving on the highway shoulder, swerved in front of him briefly to block him, then pulled back into the regular lane.
Morgan then allegedly sped up his vehicle, pulled up alongside the victims' car, and drew his gun on them.
Moriarty said that Morgan's alleged actions were unjustified and outside the course of his duties, which would be enough for the state to avoid violating the US Constitution's Supremacy Clause that prevents state governments from infringing upon the federal government's sovereignty.
"Our opinion is that illegally driving on a shoulder, pulling up to a car and pointing a gun at the heads of two community members who are not doing anything at the time, is well beyond the scope of their authority as federal agents," said Moriarty. "So they may say that, but we will litigate that in court. And there is no such thing as absolute immunity for federal agents who violate the law in the State of Minnesota or any other state."
Moriarty also brushed off concerns about the federal government retaliating against Minnesota for criminally charging ICE agents.
"Not a concern of ours," she said. "Our role, by the way, is to hold people accountable if they violate the laws of the state of Minnesota. And in this particular case, we feel strongly that this agent committed second-degree assault against both of these victims. We have charged the case and our intent is to hold them accountable."
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty: "Are we concerned as to whether there would be federal blowback? Not a concern of ours. Our role is to hold people accountable if they violate the laws of Minnesota. We feel strongly that this ICE agent committed 2nd degree assault." pic.twitter.com/G6aPyewU3q
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 16, 2026
The case against Morgan is the first state prosecution related to Operation Metro Surge, the federal immigration enforcement operation that targeted the Twin Cities earlier this year and generated unprecedented mass protests that included a one-day general strike.
Morgan's prosecution may also be a preview of future cases, as there have been calls for months to prosecute the federal immigration officers who fatally shot Minneapolis residents Renee Good and Alex Pretti.
While speaking with reporters, Moriarty emphasized that "today's charges reflect an important milestone in our efforts to seek accountability for the harms inflicted on our community during Operation Metro Surge," vowing "we will not rest until we get the answers we seek about federal agent conduct across Hennepin County, and accountability is delivered wherever appropriate."
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As Sotomayor Apologizes to Kavanaugh, Thomas Paints Progressives as Existential Threat
"Cowering liberals think this is a manners contest while conservatives are waging an ideological war," said one observer.
Apr 16, 2026
While one liberal US Supreme Court justice apologized Wednesday for mildly condescending remarks about a colleague, one of the high court's most right-wing members compared progressives to the Nazi leader Adolf Hitler—a contrast that one prominent observer called "a perfect commentary on the asymmetry in politics" between liberals and the MAGA right.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor said she apologized for "inappropriate" public comments about Justice Brett Kavanaugh's upbringing during an April 7 speech at the University of Kansas School of Law. Sotomayor, who grew up in financial poverty in the Bronx, referred to Kavanaugh’s concurring opinion in Noem v. Vasquez Perdomo, in which the son of high-powered Washington, DC attorneys brushed off the potentially fatal consequences of immigration enforcement stops.
“This is from a man whose parents were professionals," Sotomayor told the audience, "and probably doesn’t really know any person who works by the hour.”
Meanwhile on Wednesday, Justice Clarence Thomas linked the progressive movement—which Americans have to thank for many of the rights they have today, from the five-day, 40-hour workweek, to food safety and environmental protection, to near-universal civil and voting rights—with some of the 20th century's worst mass murderers.
"Progressivism seeks to replace the basic premises of the Declaration of Independence and hence our form of government," Thomas told attendees of a University of Texas event commemorating the 250th anniversary of the document's signing. "It holds that our rights and our dignities come not from God, but from government."
Thomas called the declaration "one of the greatest anti-slavery documents in the history of the Western civilization," even though its proclamation that "all men are created equal" did not apply to the 20% of the American population who were enslaved Blacks, and a condemnation of slavery was stricken from the draft due to objections from slave owners.
However, Thomas argued that the ideals in the Declaration of Independence have "fallen out of favor" among progressives.
"Progressivism was the first mainstream American political movement, with the possible exception of the pro-slavery reactionaries on the eve of the Civil War, to openly oppose the principles of the declaration" Thomas asserted. "Progressives strove to undo the declaration's commitment to equality and natural rights, both of which they denied were self-evident."
"It requires of the people a subservience and weakness incompatible with a constitution premised on the transcendent origin of our rights," he continued, adding that it "led to the governments that caused the most awful century that the world has ever seen."
"Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, and Mao all were intertwined with the rise of progressivism, and all were opposed to the natural rights on which our declaration are based," Thomas added, referring to Soviet leader Josef Stalin, the Nazi leader, and Chinese revolutionary Mao Zedong.
Balls and Strikes editor-in-chief Jay Willis responded to Thomas' remarks on Bluesky, writing that it is "genuinely funny that Sonia Sotomayor issued a public apology today for her mild criticism of a conservative colleague on a specific, substantive issue, and then a few hours later Clarence Thomas picked up a mic and was like ALL LIBERALS ARE AMERICA-HATING COWARDS."
"Clarence Thomas is a right-wing freak," Willis added. "This is an indistinguishable from what unironic retvrn guys post on X about, like, women being allowed to have bank accounts. Anyone who tells you he is a profound thinker or a serious jurist or whatever is not to be trusted."
Journalist Mehdi Hasan said on X that "if Dems had a spine, they’d run on impeaching this financially corrupt justice who got away with the allegations of sexual harassment during his hearings."
Many right-wingers, meanwhile, applauded Thomas' remarks, with Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah)—who helped try to steal the 2020 election for President Donald Trump—posting on X that "progressivism *is* an existential threat to America."
During his speech, Thomas also expressed his admiration for Harlan Crow, the Republican megadonor whose largesse to the justice and his wife Virginia—who was also involved in efforts to subvert the 2020 presidential election—has included undisclosed gifts like luxury vacations and private school tuition for a relative.
He also praised John Yoo, his former clerk and senior Justice Department lawyer who authored the infamous "torture memos" for the George W. Bush administration and publicly argued that the president has the power to order the massacre of an entire village of civilians or the crushing of a child's testicles.
Thomas closed his speech with a call to action.
"Each of you will have opportunities to be courageous every day," he said. "It may mean speaking up in class tomorrow when someone around you expects you to live by lies. It may mean confronting today's fashionable bigotries, such as antisemitism. It may mean standing up for your religion when it is mocked and disparaged by a professor."
"It may mean not budging on your principles when it will entail losing friends or being ostracized," he continued. "It may mean running for your school board when you see that they are teaching your children to hate your values and our country. It may mean turning down a job offer that requires you to make moral or ethical compromises."
This, from a justice on the nation's highest court whose moral and ethical compromises in the form of “the number, value, and extravagance of the gifts" he took from a billionaire linked to a case before that same court has "no comparison in modern American history," according to a Senate report.
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