Greenpeace launches campaign in advance of February 2025 SLAPP trial

Greenpeace is being sued by Energy Transfer, the Big Oil company behind the Dakota Access Pipeline, for $300 million.

The lawsuit is a glaringly typical Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (SLAPP) and an attempt to silence Big Oil’s critics by making its target pay unaffordable legal fees. Energy Transfer falsely claims that Greenpeace orchestrated the #NoDAPL resistance at Standing Rock, a claim that is overtly racist in its erasure of the Indigenous leadership in North Dakota.

Big Oil knows that protest works and they are trying to deter it by making the consequences too high for anyone to risk it. This is an attack on our first amendment rights and it would set dangerous new precedents that allow corporations to go after protesters for the actions of others at those protests.

The trial will take place in February 2025 in North Dakota and if they lose, Greenpeace could face financial ruin, ending 52 years of groundbreaking environmental activism. Just imagine what SLAPPs like this can mean for individuals who are targeted. There are some state-level anti-SLAPP laws that protect some people in some places, and Rep. Jamie Raskin is working to introduce the federal anti-SLAPP legislation we need to protect the rights of all Americans.

Protect the Protest exists so that we can work together to #stopSLAPPs and help protect SLAPP targets. We stand in solidarity with our coalition member organization Greenpeace in the face of this frivolous and dangerous lawsuit from Energy Transfer!

Watch Greenpeace’s campaign video below: