But as Alaskan tribes, anglers and nature lovers tried to stop them, it could be the sting that eventually ends the long battle over the Pebble Mine.
“I mean we can talk to the White House Chief of Staff at any time, but you have to be careful about all of this because it’s all reported,” said Ron Thiessen, CEO of Northern Dynasty Minerals. Was inadvertently recorded. “You don’t seem to be trying to use inappropriate influence.”
“I consider the governor a friend,” Collier says of Alaska Republican Gov. Mike Dunlevy. “It’s not uncommon for me, the largest private fundraiser for the governor in the state, to call me at my home, the governor.”
The new recordings also tell mining officials how the friendly insiders of Army Corps Engineers help them in the complex permission process led by the corps.
“In particular, with the Army Corps of Engineers, if there is something that is going to be out of the ordinary, they try and get that information to us as soon as possible,” Thisen said.
The conversation is so bad, the Northern Dynasty apologized “to all Alaskanis” when announcing Collier’s resignation, who would have received a 12 12 million bonus if the mine had been approved.
“The individuals in that video embellish their relationships with state and federal officials at all levels,” Dunley’s office fee statement said, while Army Corps Engineers Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency said the tapes did not explicitly represent their interaction with Pebble. Officers.
But Arescana’s U.S. This harsh rebuttal has been given by senators, Republicans Lisa Markowski and Dan Sullivan, who have been portrayed on tape as political beasts who secretly recognized the Pebble Mine, but cannot say so.
“Senator Murkowski, it’s very political,” Thiessen says in a tape. “She wants the project to move forward at heart. She will say things that sometimes attract people’s emotions but it will do no harm to the project as a whole.”
Collier also claimed that both senators were “just sitting in one corner and keeping quiet”, ashamed of their confusion over last month’s letter from Corps Engineers, which cast doubt on the mine.
“Let me be clear: I did not misunderstand the recent announcement by the Army Corps,” Murkowski said in a statement. “I am not ashamed of my statement on this and I will not remain silent in the corner. I am dead on the high ground for large-scale resource development in the watershed of Bristol Bay. can not. “
Longtime commercial fisherman Robin Samuels opposed the development, saying the tape reminded him of Mob.
“It looks like John Gotti and El Capo are talking to me.” “All of us are being called liars.”
And he delivered a message to Murkowski and Sullivan: “I urge our senators to come out of where you are sitting and show us some action.”
Since rich deposits of copper, gold, silver and molybdenum were discovered in the late 1980s, the Northern Dynasty and its various partners have spent nearly 20 years and અને 1 billion obtaining federal permits. Their plans include new roads, ditches, pipelines and acidic “tailings” waste ponds, on earthquake-prone land, in the middle of a fragile ecosystem that believes Bristol is too close to rest in the flowing currents of the bay.
In the presidency of President Barack Obama, the EPA called for the Clean Water Act to kill all projects, but the Pearl Mine came to life again under Trump’s rule as the Northern Dynasty agreed to eliminate the use of cyanide, shrink the mine action and just run it. 20 years. But Pebble Tapes reveals their plans to expand the mine for nearly two centuries while developing many other new mines in the area.
“The Clean Water Act states that Army Corps Engineers will at least issue permits to the environment based on a practical option that is harmful to the environment,” Thiessen said in a conversation. “So I mean, you can still do a lot of environmental damage but you get your permission if it’s the least harmful option.”
The tapes also show a rare glimpse of the political shapeshifting used to gain advantage. Collier was the former chief of staff of Home Secretary Bruce Babbitt, led by President Bill Clinton, and the current former Pebble CEO used these credentials with environmentalists becoming “well-known Republican fundraisers” in Alaska.
“Now, with that said, it’s possible that we can get Biden as president, and if we do, I’ll brush up my Democratic credentials and start using them more actively than I do.”
“Everyone who has been listening to Pebble’s talk for 10 years thinks I’m lying,” Collier told CNN in 2018. Collier told CNN in 2018, “But I’ve got an ace in my hand and it’s a process of giving permission. It’s a truth-testing process.” If I’m not telling the truth, we don’t get permission. . “
This time, Collier declined CNN’s request for comment, but a spokesman told the Washington Post that “he is heartened by the manner in which Alaskan senators are influential and important.”
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