Starting at noon on February 13th, over 800,000 people across the U.S. signed a petition urging Congress to stop the Keystone XL Tar Sands pipeline – 800,000! Equally impressive, Virginians made up over 19,000 of those signatures. All in just 24 hours. And today a dozen volunteers delivered that message loud and clear to Senators Warner and Webb.

The 24-hour action was set in motion after organizers gained intel that members of Congress in the pocket of the fossil fuel lobby were trying to force through approval of the pipeline through amendments to unrelated bills. Late last Thursday, we learned even more sudden news that a vote could be imminent – as soon as this Tuesday or Wednesday – on an amendment to a federal transportation bill.

The amendment, sponsored by GOP Sens. Hoeven, Lugar and Vitter would take the decision out of the Obama administration’s hands by eliminating the need for a federal permit to cross the U.S.-Canada border and giving Nebraska unlimited time to develop an alternative route through the state.

Virginians raised their voices loud and clear last week and over the past six months by signing petitions, getting arrested as part of the mass civil disobedience actions between August 20th and September 3rd, and turning out en masse to the November 6th action to encircle the White House. Today we made sure that Senators Warner and Webb could not ignore the will of over 19,000 of their constituents calling on them to oppose the latest backhanded maneuver from our opposition.