Police clear last Dakota Access protesters from camp

North Dakota police clearing protesters at the makeshift camp near the Standing Rock Indian Reservation are preparing for a “worst-case SWAT scenario”—an armed demonstrator barricaded in one of the camp’s buildings. Federal officials ordered protesters to leave the camp on land owned by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers by Wednesday. Most did, but those who remain are willing to take “drastic measures” to stay put, leaders warned. The protesters are trying to stop Texas-based Energy Transfer Partners from completing the Dakota Access pipeline, which will carry oil through the Dakotas and Iowa to a shipping point in Illinois. The Standing Rock Sioux and Cheyenne River Sioux tribes say the pipeline threatens cultural sites and drinking water sources. The Obama administration put the project on hold, pending additional review, but the Trump administration ordered it to proceed shortly after the new president took office. Around noon today, National Guardsmen joined police to enter the camp from two directions, going tent-to-tent to arrest remaining protesters.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.