among those we will be speaking to, the standing rock sioux chairman dave archambault. the seattle city council has voted unanimously to divest $3 billion from wells fargo over the bank's backing of the dakota access pipeline. the divestment legislation was first introduced by socialist city councilwoman kshama sawant in response to a demand by indigenous water protectors that individuals, cities, and native american nations cut ties with wells fargo and other banks that are investing in the pipeline. the muckleshoot tribe in seattle, the nez perce tribe in idaho and the mille lacs band of , ojibwe in minnesota have also committed to divesting from wells fargo. on capitol hill, the senate has confirmed billionaire betsy devos for education secretary, after a historic tiebreaking vote from vice president mike pence. devos' nomination has sparked widespread outrage and resistance among education advocates, who are concerned devos will move to defund and privatize public education. devos is a longtime backer of charter schools and vouchers for private and religious schools

to begin, we're joined by dave archambault, chairman of the standing rock sioux tribe.e is currently in washington, d.c. welcome to democracy now! can you respond to the word that just came down yesterday? >> amy, this is something that we do not think was going to happen yesterday. we had a status conference with the judge. the judge asked the department of justice when a decision was going to be rendered. the corps of engineers said they were reviewing the process and most likely would be friday or maybe next week. so i made plans to come out to d.c. and try this one last attempt to meet with the army corps of engineers before they made the decision. with theto try to meet white house. i had a meeting set up with intergovernmental affairs william kirkland. as soon as i landed, i got notice. it was disheartening. i canceled my meeting with the white house because, obviously, they're not willing to listen. they don't want to hear from the tribe, which is unfortunate. this is something that we were so thankful that the previous administration at least took the time and l

our request for comment but joining me now by phone from cannonball, north dakota, is chairman dave archambaults talk about the meeting that was supposed to take place. what happened? >> thank you, joy. i was trying to meet with anybody in the white house, anybody under the trump administration just to hear our side before any decisions were made, and i think that's important for any leader to be well informed on any issue, any matter. and we had a -- i finally got through once, somebody from the department of interior was placed and i said i need to meet with somebody in the white house. it was with william kirkland, intergovernmental affairs. he said let's schedule a meeting for the following weeks. he said what days will work? i'm available monday through wednesday. i said, i need to meet as soon as possible. mon is perfect. i started scheduling my flight. he called me back and said i can't meet with you monday, wednesday is the only day that works. on that monday we had a status conference call with the judge and the judge had asked the department of justice when the -- they were going to m