Video: #NoDAPL Protesters Punch Law Enforcement Officials as Another 16 Are Arrested

According to a press release from Morton County which dropped in my inbox this evening there were another 16 arrests of #NoDAPL protesters over the last day or so. The charges range from “criminal trespass, engaging in a riot, possession of marijuana, fleeing, assault on a peace officer and preventing arrest.”

You can read the full press release below. They’ve also released more video from yesterday’s attack on law enforcement officers. The feature image above shows a man in a green jacket literally trying to box a law enforcement officer after repeated hitting the National Guard personnel holding the shields.

Keep in mind, the events in the video happen after the protesters marched across frozen water and then cut their way through a razor wire fence. Yet the narrative from the protester social media accounts is that this was a peaceful “prayer march.”

Morton County also provided photos of what they’re describing as “homemade tire deflating devices” which were apparently placed along Highway 1806 near Huff, ND.

It’s hard to imagine what sort of a political point this sort of mindless attempted vandalism promotes. Are they expecting someone to run over one of these things and then, while changing their tire in the winter cold, reconsider their support for the pipeline? Or find a more nuanced understanding of tribal rights?

Any moral authority this protest movement might have once had to speak on any political issue from the environment to Native American self governance has evaporated amid these belligerent assaults on law and order.

And that was before the Standing Rock Sioux tribe started asking these thugs to clean up their  mess and go home.

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