This weekend, 35 students from Washington University joined an estimated 12,000 people to form three rings around the White House on Sunday afternoon. The students went to Washington, D.C., to protest the construction of a 1,700-mile-long crude oil pipeline called Keystone XL, which would run from Alberta, Canada, to the Gulf Coast of Texas.

Last Tuesday, two members of Green Action attended a fundraiser for President Obama at which they interrupted him during a speech, questioning him about his future plans for the Keystone XL pipeline.

Yesterday I attended a protest at President Obama’s St. Louis campaign fundraiser, urging him to reject the proposed Keystone XL pipeline for Canadian tar sands oil. In August, 1,253 brave people were arrested in acts of civil disobedience outside the White House in order to send the same message: reject the Keystone XL. I was not able to make it to D.C.