Former Democratic House Candidate Chase Iron Eyes Urges #NoDAPL Protesters to Lawlessness

UPDATE: Chase Iron Eyes will be on my radio show on WDAY AM970 tomorrow at 1:30pm.

Shortly before announcing his candidacy for the U.S. House earlier this year Democrat Chase Iron Eyes deleted the entirety of his prodigious social media presence. Those who followed Iron Eyes prior to his campaign knew why he did that. He was prone to saying pretty extreme things which he clearly didn’t want North Dakota voters to be aware of.

But now, just a couple of weeks after the campaign ended, Iron Eyes seems to be going back to his old ways. On Facebook last night Iron Eyes wrote a message to his followers calling for lawlessness from the #NoDAPL protesters who are working to obstruct the Dakota Access Pipeline:

Iron Eyes seems to be saying that the ends justify the means for #NoDAPL, and that is scary rhetorical territory on which to tread given some of the dangerous, violent stunts the protesters have pulled in the past.

Not the least is attempting to block railroad tracks with a burning pickup truck. In a follow-up post, Iron Eyes claims he’s only supporting civil disobedience and not violence, but those words ring hollow given how much of the disobedience we’ve seen from the protesters has been something less than civil:

Living in a democratic society charges us with accepting the rule of law even when the law is something we might not like. There are plentiful avenues available for the peaceful reform of our laws, and through those is how change must be effected.

Granted, Iron Eyes and his fellow #NoDAPL activists have little chance for success through those avenues, mostly because they’ve staked out an extreme political position on pipelines and oil development which most Americans disagree with.

But that’s hardly justification for Iron Eyes to call for lawlessness.

I would hope that North Dakota Democrats would condemn Iron Eyes for these words. They are unhelpful as we North Dakotans try to find a peaceful path forward on this issue.