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If the Seminole Nation can ban data centers, surely we can too

While the news received very little mainstream media attention, the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma has accomplished something profound: they quickly and cleanly banned data centers on their native land. No quibbling, equivocating, or cutting backroom deals while simultaneously telling their people they were on their side, they just did it. As reported by Native News Online, the Seminole Nation had been approached by a developer with the data center proposal, followed by a request to sign a non-disclosure agreement and a letter of intent. While most Oklahoma community leaders would jump at this opportunity (they’ve virtually all been jumping), Seminole leaders held a town hall to discuss the matter on March 3rd, and vote unanimously to, 

““implement a moratorium on the advancement of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology and hyperscale data center development within the Seminole Nation and within tribal lands and territories.”

What a wonderful example of single-minded courage they’ve provided for the rest of Oklahoma. Can we live up to it? While it’s been slow in coming, signs of resistance are beginning to pop up around the state. Tulsa and Oklahoma City have both passed temporary moratoriums on construction of new data centers, to address shortfalls and gaps in zoning regulations, which highlights the exploitative nature of the data center land rush: they’re taking advantage of areas with lax zoning laws around the country. It’s now common knowledge that developers actively seek out areas with easily-wooed council members, along with overly-lenient zoning laws and an executive and legislature hypnotized by “growth” at any cost. More than anything we need elected leaders slightly less willing to sell our state down river. Seems like a low bar, but one that vanishingly few of our leaders appear willing to clear.

Thanks to this plague of moral cowardice, data center development is running wild like an invasive species in the Sooner State. Every week we hear of a new proposed data center, and we find out that some small town council has been in talks for months, and they’ve already signed the NDA and letter of intent, all under the noses of the people they’re supposed to represent. By the time the plans are made public, the data center seems inevitable. Protests, lawsuits, council meeting crowds, there is a feeling of futility among communities, who feel as if they’ve been kept out of the loop on purpose. They, who will be forced to foot the bill in higher utility bills and a generationally blighted landscape, get no say in the matter. 

In the United States alone, around 4,000 data centers already exist, and 1,500 to 3,000 are being planned. Contrast this with the fact that the country with the next highest amount is Germany, with only 500. China, who we’re constantly being told is the reason we’re building these facilities at such a break-neck pace, has only around 400. What is going on here? Who, and what, are these for? What could possibly justify the enormous resource drain that data centers inflict on the communities they move into? 

Last year, data centers in the US consumed roughly 224 terawatt hours of electricity, or 4.5% of the total electricity supply of the US for that year. By 2030, that electricity consumption is expected to reach 17%. But given the rapid pace of data center construction, that number could reach much higher. 

In 2025, US data centers drained over 260 billion gallons of water from the total supply.  Google’s data center campus near Pryor, Oklahoma, alone used 1.1 billion gallons of water in the same year. Also last year in Texas, data centers used a staggering 25 billion gallons of water. Is this really sustainable? The question seems rhetorical. There’s an unsettling realization occurring that no one allowing these data centers to be built is giving the slightest thought to long-term consequences of allowing our power and water to be drained in this way. 

The Seminole Nation of Oklahoma has shown us that data centers are not inevitable. So why are we being made to believe that they are? Why are so many being built here compared to other countries? What are they going to be used for, and will it benefit us or enslave us within a digital panopticon? Myself and others are getting a very bad feeling about this rapid and unchecked rise of AI data centers, and what comes after this AI infrastructure in put into place. Not merely in resource drain, but consequences for privacy and civil liberties. With our every movement tracked and recorded, can it reasonably be said that privacy will cease to exist even just a few years from now? Will every facet of our lives be catalogued, judged, even predicted? Will AI be used to assign each of us a social credit score? Does freedom and prosperity really seem compatible in slightest with this rapid rise of an AI oligarchy? 

Our elected leaders, for the most part, appear slavish in the face of Big Tech. Whether it’s our schools, city councils, state and federal legislatures, few are willing to just say no. 

The Age of Apathy must come to an end. We have to wake up and fight back. Anything less would be an insult to our heritage of American liberty, and to  the legacy that we wish to pass on to our descendants.

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Take A POLL And Comment – What Will Be The Topic Of Dark Money Mailers Against HD36 Candidate Jenni White?

Because I’ve written extensively on Dark Money in Oklahoma elections, it felt like a truly amusing way to pass what little free time we all have left as we try and navigate today’s skyrocketing inflation, making up titles and concepts for the Dark Money mailers sure to inundate our mailboxes right before the June 16th Primary Election.

But first, let’s take a poll:

Maybe some of our political consulting friends will opt in to the poll!

Here’s a clip of the ROPE Report podcast from Wednesday, May 6th, where Michael and I had fun making jokes about this very thing:

So, if you’d like to join in on the fun, make sure to drop YOUR idea for a dark money mailer against Jenni in the comments below! (PS: please make them clean, funny and not gross or mean – we’re just having fun here!)

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Two Articles That Need Sharing Now

Oklahoma News Headlines

If you haven’t read – or subscribed to – the Ramblings of a Domesticated Warrior Substack, please do. She has so many really good short and sweet, but informative, articles about things that are happening in Oklahoma and what those things can mean for Oklahomans.

Today, I found this in my inbox: The Foreign Land Loophole: Why SB 1705 Still Doesn’t Protect Oklahomans. I’m not going to synopsize the article, it’s short, but let me just say that I’ve written about this numerous times – the fact that the legislature passes bills that are meaningless when it comes time for Oklahomans to depend upon them to protect their liberty or property. Oh, these bills make great news clip fodder for the author, but they don’t actually DO what they mean for Oklahomans. Read the article, you’ll see what I mean.

The next is from David Arnett and his Substack, “Straight Up” – another Substack to which you should subscribe! Today, he’s written, “Tulsa County Data Center Opposed” about the opposition to a new data center planned for the Tulsa area. Who is opposing? Arnett does a great job of summarizing the issue and who is involved. If you don’t think this is important to you because you don’t live in Tulsa, I’m warning you – data centers are the next big thing to come to your neighborhood with all their baggage. You will definitely want to know what’s going on in Tulsa in case it shows up in YOUR backyard.

Again, these are quick and informative reads that give you definite insight into things happening here in Oklahoma right now. Please read and share!

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A digital flyer displaying the June podcast schedule for ROPE Report. It lists various speakers and topics for each date in June, set against a beach background.
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Oklahoma’s Republican Supermajority Passes More Democrat Bills Through The House Than Republican Bills

Republicans Lose To Democrats in a Republican Supermajority

Oh, don’t get me started on this two-tiered committee system dreamed up by the House leadership this year. If you haven’t seen my critique of the House on Organizational Day, you might want to take a bit to at least listen to that. It was a phenomenal specter of what we’ve now seen as the House and Senate begin to hear each other’s bills and head for the legislative finish line.

You might even follow that up by reading this overview of what happened to at least one of our House members this year – not a single one of Representative Jim Shaw’s bills were heard on the floor. Not. A. One. In fact, I make the argument that, in a way, everyone in his district should throw their own little Boston Tea Party because I couldn’t find a better current day example of Taxation Without Representation. Honestly, disgusting – but again – I think those of us who have watched politics for a time could have seen that coming.

Former House Rep. Jason Murphy penned a phenomenal article summing up the huge issue of our Republican majority House, passing more Democratic bills out to the Senate than Republicans. I’ve asked his permission to copy some of that into this blog because you need to see his commentary. If you’d like to share his article directly, it’s called, “Why is Oklahoma’s GOP House Protecting Illegal Alien Drivers? The Secret Behind The Blocked Effort to Close The Illegal Alien Driver’s License Loophole?” and you can find it on his Oklahoma State Capitol Substack.

Below is a section from his article:

Navigating even one committee in the House’s smoke-and-mirrors system is challenging enough, especially when certain privileged legislators can kill bills without proper consideration. Navigating two committees, however, is mighty difficult for grassroots legislation lacking institutional support. Such legislation will most certainly struggle to pass through the closed-door decisions of two separate committee chairmen, either of whom can single-handedly halt a bill’s progress.

This essentially created a new layer through which grassroots legislation could be killed without the people closest to the Speaker having to get their hands dirty by refusing to give the bill a hearing before the full house.

So, back to Murphy’s article? What was that case-in-point bill, killed by the system?

It was House Bill 1043. And it was a vital proposal, based on an already enacted Florida law, that closes the loophole by which illegal invaders of our nation are using blue-state driver’s licenses to drive on Oklahoma roads.

Nineteen states reportedly offer driving privileges to the invaders, including New Mexico and Colorado, states that border Oklahoma.

The need for House Bill 1043 became very apparent when Oklahoma City Democrat Arturo Alonso-Sandoval, in declaring his opposition to the reform, reportedly claimed that “many” are using out-of-state licenses.

If Alonso-Sandoval is correct, Oklahoma’s roads are likely buzzing with those who have been enabled by blue states to bypass our driving laws and regulations. They are presumably living in Oklahoma but aren’t following the requirement that Oklahoma residents must obtain an Oklahoma driver’s license to drive on our roads. They’ve found a blue-state-enabled loophole and once again, a way to get around the laws and regulations by which the citizens are governed.

This disrespect for our laws, is sure to have consequences. Anyone who has been in Oklahoma City traffic recently, has no doubt taken note that something is now very wrong: it’s almost impossible to drive through that city without encountering an insane driver who has no regard for the traffic laws—almost as if they have no reason to respect the laws or fear of their enforcement.

House Bill 1043, by Jenkins of the House and Bullard of the Senate, would have closed that blue-state-enabled loophole by refusing to recognize these illegal alien driver’s licenses.

The bill was heard in the public safety committee where it was unanimously approved.

At that point, the legislation should have advanced to the house floor for a hearing before the full house.

But that’s where Hilbert’s new system—and one tyrannical super committee chairman—stood in the way. That chairman, Robert Manger, recently eked out a narrow election win after declaring to his constituents that he was 100% conservative. How, or what he based that on, is unclear, but it was just enough of a head fake to eke out a victory. But what is known, is that according to The Oklahoma Constitution’s Conservative Index—which since 1979 has been Oklahoma’s gold standard for gauging the voting of legislators—Manger actually scored a mere 60% conservative score in 2024.

————————————————-

But no, the self-declared 100% conservative, Manger, simply refused to as much as give the bill a hearing in his committee.

Thus House Bill 1043 provides us with the perfect case-in-point of how Kyle Hilbert’s new committee system is functioning. It’s another new hallway of smoke and mirrors added to the already crazy house that is the House of Representatives.

So, if after reading that, you can’t see your way to become involved in the 2026 elections in order to get some of the worst offenders of this system out, then please move to another state – like Colorado or California – they’re already ruined. In the meantime, follow those of us reporting on grassroots efforts and let’s push back with everything we have. This is getting nuts.

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Jason Hardaway, Constitution Coach Talks Constitution Education

Constitution Coaching

Friday, April 4th, Michael and I welcomed Jason Hardaway to the show. Jason is a Constitution Coach trained through the Patriot Academy – an organization spearheaded by attorney and former Texas Representative, Rick Green.

Jason got involved in learning more about his government when he became a Precinct Chair at his Republican county convention in 2020. He had no idea what a Precinct Chairman did, but he also realized he didn’t know much about government – including the Constitution – so he set out to educate himself.

One day, he went to an event with David Barton and was able to see the Constitution Alive series that David has. That excited Jason and he went home and started having friends and family come to his house to watch the videos and discuss the founding of the country. About a year ago, he became a Constitution Coach with Patriot Academy and he’s never looked back!

In the video below, Jason explains why America is NOT a Democracy, America is governed via a Constitutional Republic. If you want to share this video, you can find it on our YouTube channel. Chances are, we ALL know someone who is completely misinformed about this and needs a good bit of explanation on the topic!

We talked about so many different issues during the time Jason was on! I know it’s two hours, but you should really take the time to go back and watch the entire video if you can. You can find it here on our YouTube and Rumble channels. In the next clip, we talked to Jason about the fact that we don’t even use the Constitution in the Judicial Branch the way it was supposed to have been used. Instead of lining up laws with the Constitution itself to determine if they’re ‘constitutional’ or not, now we use CASE LAW to make those determinations and it’s just wrong.

One of the things we talked quite a lot about was the Supreme Court deciding whether or not the state of Oklahoma can provide taxpayer funds to run a Catholic online charter school. Michael and I disagree with this notion entirely and we talked about what the Constitution says about that and what the Founders would say if they were here today (and not rolling over in their graves fast enough to create the gravity for earth). In the clip below, all three of us chimed in on different aspects of the Separation of Church and State argument. Again, I just put together several different segments from the full video to make this clip, it’s best to watch the whole video to get the full idea of our arguments.

Please, look up Patriot Academy online to find out what they can offer you in terms of education on the Constitution and our Republican form of government. Also, if you have any questions for Jason, or would like to attend one of his classes, email him here coachmentorhardaway@gmail.com. And please don’t forget, Jason has a new class that he’ll be starting up on May 5th called “Biblical Literacy” at the Woodland Hills Baptist Church in Newcastle beginning at 6pm in the evenings. If you’d like to attend, reach out to Jason! He’ll be happy to sign you up!

President Reagan said, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.” If we don’t learn about the Constitution and our Republican form of government and THEN if we don’t make our elected officials follow that path, we will not recover and it will be US telling our grandkids what it was like when we were once a free people.

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Which Oklahoma Representatives Voted To Allow Non-Citizens To Have Law Enforcement Power Over Oklahoma Citizens?

non-citizens arresting citizens?

Apparently, at some point, our Oklahoma legislature voted to allow NON-CITIZENS TO BE OKLAHOMA LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS.

This morning, the Oklahoma House voted NOT TO REPEAL THAT LANGUAGE.

Here is the bill – HB1190. Please note; this is an amendatory bill – meaning that somewhere in the existing bill’s language, you’ll find language that is stricken through (repealed) or underlined (added to law).

Oklahoma conservative stalwart, Representative Rick West, authored the bill, which exists of only the repealed language on page 18 – below:

E. 1. No person shall be eligible for employment as a peace officer or reserve peace officer until the employing law enforcement agency has conducted a background investigation of such person consisting of the following:

i. such person has provided proof of United States citizenship or resident alien status, pursuant to an employment eligibility verification form from the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services.

And this NEW language on pages 23 and 24 – below:

F. No person shall be certified as a police or peace officer by the Council or be employed by the state, a county, a city, or any political subdivision thereof, who is:

  1. Is a permanent resident alien; provided, however, any person who has been trained and certified by the Council and is actively employed as a full-time peace officer as of November 1, 2025, shall not be subject to the provisions of this paragraph.

This morning, Representative Jay Steagall texted me the following X post:

Along with the link to the X post, Rep. Steagall texted, “Imagine living in a state, where just last year the People voted to ensure that ONLY citizens could vote, yet the Oklahoma House of Representatives defiantly ensures the ability for non-citizens to enforce the law. This makes absolutely no sense to me.”

As Horowitz said in his post, “I get it that many of them are uncomfortable excluding legal permanent residents. Yes, all private sector jobs are opened to them. However, we are a nation of citizens and we should not have non citizens with law enforcement powers over citizens.”

AMEN! How in the world does allowing a non-citizen of Oklahoma – let alone AMERICA – arrest me protect my rights and my liberties? What’s the point of being a citizen of this state or nation then?

So, in case you can’t see it on the X post, I’m pasting the NO votes below because we need to know ALL the HOUSE members in the SQUISHY MIDDLE without enough guts to stand up to the PC crowd who tells us we can’t discriminate against people WHO AREN’T CITIZENS IN THIS COUNTRY!

FYI: This passed through the Public Safety Committee with the following votes:

YEAS:    5 – Hardin, Humphrey, Kelley, May, Turner       

NAYS:    1 – Lowe (J)       

It passed through the Public Safety OVERSIGHT Committee with the following votes:

YEAS:   10 – Culver, Duel, Ford, Hardin, Harris, Kane, Kannady, Manger, Sterling, Worthen          

NAYS:    3 – Lowe (J), Rosecrants, Schreiber   

Think on that a second: Culver, Duel, Ford, Harris, Kane, Manger and Sterling voted to allow the bill to pass from committee to be heard on the floor, where they voted against it. Yes, it’s great these Reps allowed the bill to be debated on the floor, but it’s very sad they didn’t have the guts to vote FOR it on the floor.

Truly, this is NOT OK, but virtually the same thing was done on the Senate side yesterday when they voted to allow anti-Semitism to become a legal offense in Oklahoma, invalidating every Oklahoman’s First Amendment Right. Here are the Senators who voted FOR that:

NOW YOU HAVE THE NAMES OF THE SQUISHY MIDDLE IN BOTH THE HOUSE AND THE SENATE. Let’s work to educate the newbies in the Senate (Gillespie, Grellner, McIntosh and Wingard) and toss out the rest.

Representative Rick West responded to my request for comment. Here’s the gist of what he said.

Rick said he’d run the bill twice or three times before at the request of a constituent and it had always passed out of the house before, but never got a hearing in the Senate. This time he was shocked that it went down in the House. He knew the Democrats would vote against it, but he was pretty shocked at the attitude some House members had about non-US citizens going through CLEET training.

“They can’t vote, but we’re going to allow them to go through CLEET?” he sked.

He told me he thinks that this particular law has been on the books as long as Oklahoma has had the law establishing CLEET.

I asked him if he knew whether or not we had non-citizens in any of our Oklahoma law enforcement arms since the provision has been in law so long.

“When I first ran this bill I did the research. No, I don’t know of any that are hired in law enforcement. I know the OSBI doesn’t have any, I know the other law enforcement don’t have any. Someone made a good point – you have to be a US citizen to be hired by all the US law enforcement services, so what are we doing here in Oklahoma allowing non-citizens to be CLEET certified and carry a gun and arrest US citizens?” he asked.

He said that some of the pushback he received from House members was from some in law enforcement who felt that interpreters were needed, but he made it clear that anyone wanting to be an interpreter can interpret without going through CLEET training.

The oddest thing to Rep. West was that, though the Democrats asked the same questions they always have, the mood was different with the Republicans this time. They told him things like – we need these people, we have a shortage of law enforcement – and that surprised him.

He told me that he’s had bills getting voted down, that wasn’t the issue. It was the mood of the legislature this time on this issue that struck him more than anything and that, I think, should concern ALL conservative Oklahomans.

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Former OK Rep Jason Murphy Talks About 2025’s Bad Bills – And More

Jason Murphy Talks Oklahoma Legilsation

Friday, March 21st, former Oklahoma Representative Jason Murphy came on with Michael and I to talk about legislation making its way through the Oklahoma legislature. I would really urge you to watch this particular FULL video (Rumble or YouTube) because we talked about a number of bills. Here, in this synopsis, I’ll touch on the ones we felt were most important.

HB2289 is the one Jason calls, “the thin-skinned congressman bill” because it sounds like one of our elected congressional whiners (that would be all of them but Josh Brecheen and Kevin Hern ) made it up and asked leadership to run it. It basically gives an entire list of things you can’t do/say about our elected federal officials. Bad. And NO. Please contact your Senators at this point and ask them to watch for this crappy bill. Here’s Jason talking about it.

Feel free to go directly to this video clip on YouTube and share to friends and Senators from there.

Another thing Jason wanted to stress, is that the grassroots is rising. More and more people in Oklahoma are paying attention to the games being played at 23rd and Lincoln and who holds power and why. This is such a great thing because it will allow us to finally get our LIBERTY back – finally control our destinies a bit as our forefathers expected us to do. So many of us – like Jason and ROPE – are creating Substacks and media channels that tell the public what is actually going on and not what the legacy media is telling us is going on. The spread of this kind of information is VITAL to an educated populace, so SUBSCRIBE to as many new media authors as you can stand, get educated, educate others and stand up against the global mindset that wants to subjugate us!

As I said, check out the full video where we talk about what happened with new Representative Jim Shaw – absolutely ZERO of his bills were heard in the House this year as payback for beating out entrenched RINO Kevin Wallace – and other bills that weren’t heard, as well as those that were heard but voted down. He even had a few GOOD ones in the mix, like HB1162 – to allow raw milk sales – and HB1515 – the one by new Rep Molly Jenkins that would have allowed absentee voting for only those Oklahomans who had a reason to vote absentee. Interestingly a number of conservatives voted against the bill.

Rep. Steagall and I have been arguing back and forth most of the day over the bill – though it’s too late for this session. My argument is that we KNOW – certainly in Edmond – that absentee ballots have changed election results. Having absentee ballots sent out in the mail indiscriminately (which has happened) allows nefarious people to use the ballots toward their end. In addition, having as many absentee ballots as are used now, over the days that they are allowed to turn them in, poses real issues for chain of custody. It used to be that, unless you had an excuse as to why you couldn’t turn up at the poll, you had to turn up at the poll.

Rep Steagall believes that it’s no one’s business why anyone votes absentee and that it’s a security risk to the family of the deployed to have to disclose that they are not in the country or otherwise deployed. We’re still arguing…LOL.

The bottom line here is that this session – certainly in the House – has been very difficult to follow with the ‘new’ (old) committee system of ‘oversight’ committees (that didn’t work the last time they were used) and that leadership still seems to have the same lock on legislation – cutting out “we the people” – that they always have. We’ll continue to ask Jason back to give us updates when he’s able. In the meantime, make sure you’re following people who are following legislation and follow Jason’s substack at OklahomaStateCapitol.substack.com! We’re only half-way through the session.

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Dumping Human Waste On Farmland Must Be Stopped

We lost our third sheep of the week last night and I fell asleep – exhausted – on a pillow wet with tears.

She was an adorable little ‘elf-eared’ lamb that had been born too small and apparently with a heart condition. We brought her in to the house when we noticed her odd respirations and I struggled all day to save her, but her heart gave out about 10 minutes after I’d turned out the light and laid down on my sleeping bag next to her so she could still feel part of a flock.

Though I had to see her die, I got the joy of watching her have what we call, a baby ‘lamb’ dream about five minutes before. Happily, she’d gotten comfortable enough for a few minutes at least, to start feeling as though she was running through the grass, her little legs pawing the air as she lay otherwise quietly on her side.

Earlier in the week, we’d been forced to put down an ewe who had twin 6-week-old lambs at her side because of a fast-moving skin cancer that started on her eyelid. We thought she could make it until the lambs were weaned – and she was close – but we hadn’t noticed that her milk had dried up as her body fought the illness. Consequently, dehydrated, and hypothermic thanks to the super cold we’ve been having, we lost the little girl and had to take the little boy to the vet to become the 6-million-dollar lamb.

Though this is often the kind of thing farmers deal with, I can’t help wondering if there might be something more at play.

Farmers Hurting Farmers

My husband and I have a little 10-acre farm where we raise chickens, ducks, turkeys, a completely loveable (but ungrateful) mother/daughter donkey pair, four dogs and two small flocks of sheep. We happily exist without government subsidies and we wedge our sometimes-burgeoning vet bills into our one salary budget and struggle to make ends meet.

In the nine years we’ve farmed it, our place has never turned a profit, but our large garden – and the sheep – would absolutely keep us able to feed ourselves if the crap ever hit the fan and that means a lot to us.

Where I live, there are tons of little farmers like us who don’t go to the sale barn with their cattle herds or time the market so they can make the most of their soybean crop. I support the bigger, independent ranchers and farmers out here, though, because they feed a lot of people in our area and beyond. That is, to a point.

There are some even bigger differences between us and some of them beyond size. For instance, we won’t pour ‘free’ human sewage on ANY of our pastures, like some of our bigger neighbors who use this as a way to keep from having to buy expensive commercial fertilizers.

Yes, you read that right. Human sewage – the solid remnants of wastewater treatment plants, which is collected, dried, ‘treated’ and then provided to farmers as FREE fertilizer.

I had no idea about any of this until about 5 years ago when a neighbor/homeschool friend told me about the process.

Dumping Human Waste On Farmland Stinks

Saundra has a farm where she and her husband raise American Mammoth donkeys, which they milk (yes, like a cow). Studies indicate that donkey milk is one of the best substances in the world for treating numbers of human ailments. She not only sells the milk to appreciative families, but she uses it to make a line of soaps and beauty products for sale on her website.

One day when we had our kids at co-op, Saundra began telling me about the practice of dumping human waste on farmland. She told me she’d first found out about it after smelling something horrible coming from her neighbor’s property. After visiting with the neighbors and finding that they were literally spreading human feces on the land next door to her donkey dairy, she began to do lots of research.

Essentially, biosludge/humanure/biosolids, contain ANYTHING that goes down a sewer and into a water treatment plant. Anything: viruses, bacteria, hormones, pharmaceuticals, heavy metals and products from industrial processes, including PFAS – known cancer-causing chemicals used in things like firefighting foam and waterproofing compounds that are classified as ‘forever’ chemicals, because removing them from the environment is virtually impossible.

This disgusting concoction is trucked out to pastures, sprayed or dumped onto the land and disc’ed into the soil with a tractor. Unfortunately, neighbors often report seeing biosludge resting on the top of the soil like a toxic coat for weeks, or even months and – during that time – the smell is palpable. Truly – even if it’s disc’ed in – the odor is unlike anything that can be described; an unholy union between something toxically chemical and something about midway through the decay process.

We’ve had it dumped near us and what’s worse, months after the original horrific assault to the senses, when it rains, the smell comes back as bad, or worse, than before.

But the smell tells only part of the story. The rest resides in the ground, where that slurry of chemicals and human waste can leach through the ground, or runoff into water sources that livestock and people drink, or get baked into the hay fed to livestock, that are then fed to people.

Human Waste + Farmland = Toxic Produce

Maine has had its share of destruction from this practice. Farmer after farmer has been forced out of business due to the ripples of PFAS toxicity across Maine’s cropland and water supplies.

In 2021, Maine was testing 34 towns found to have substantial PFAS contamination – including a town where one farm produced milk with more than 150 times the state standard level. By 2022, Maine had become the first state in the union to ban the spreading of biosludge, yet today, PFAS contamination due to biosludge ‘fertilizer’ has been found on over 100 Maine farms and 500 residential properties.  For consumers buying locally to provide ‘healthier’ food choices, this is truly concerning.

Unfortunately, Maine isn’t the only state struggling with PFAS contamination from biosludge.

In Texas, concerned landowners are speaking out against the practice after two Texas farms have sued Synagro – a company which provides biosludge ‘fertilizer’ to farmers – for not being transparent about the chemicals in their wastewater slurry. Dead fish and calves from affected farms have been tested by the county and found to have “30,000 times higher than EPA’s standard for daily [PFAS] exposure”.

In Oklahoma, where Synagro also distributes ‘free’ biosludge to farmers in east central Oklahoma where Saundra and I live, farmers like us have been speaking out against the practice for years, but our pleas have fallen on deaf ears at the state Capitol.

Shane Jett, an Oklahoma Senator who is one of a very few lawmakers fighting to curtail and/or ban the practice in Oklahoma, recently summed up the issue with enormous clarity, “Effectively, we have a government agency [municipalities] that is colluding – to save money, or make money – with a private corporation [wastewater treatment companies] competing with the private sector and they’re assuring us that it’s ‘safe and effective’. Does that sound like anything we’ve heard before?”

Free Doesn’t Mean “Good”

And this is the tale. Farmers want to save money, so they take biosludge to use as ‘fertilizer’ from companies that promise they’ve tested the constituents of the slurry, and municipalities that pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to wastewater treatment companies like Synagro to rid themselves of their municipal waste. Farmers then defend the practice because it saves them thousands of dollars and they’re told it’s ‘safe and effective’ by everyone from the EPA to their local environmental quality agency .

Yet, if the Texas lawsuit against Synagro tells us anything, it’s that something is missing in the transparency of the process that’s leaving farmers and – down the line – consumers at risk.

In 2020, while I was Mayor of our little town, Saundra gave a presentation to our town board about the dangers of PFAS contamination through biosludge. Our town has a very high water table which provides a very real possibility of PFAS percolation through the soil, or run off from the soil, into our local aquifer. Our Town Council sided with Saundra and became the first (and so far only) Town in Oklahoma to ban the practice of spreading biosludge on farmland, even after a presentation from a California-based Synagro employee designed to show us the rainbows and unicorns associated with its use.

Many legislators make this issue about property rights. “It’s the landowner’s decision to use this on their land”, they’ll tell us – more than likely after a waste-water treatment lobbyist has dropped by to suggest they should be protected from lawsuits resulting from biosludge application – but it’s not. Your property rights end when they infringe upon mine and I have just as much right to clean water and chemical-free produce as everyone else who buys “farmfresh” produce expecting it to mean what it says.

And I can’t help but wonder, as I bury my little ‘elf-eared’ lamb this morning, if her condition – or the other ewe’s – had anything to do with our well-water. Is it contaminated with PFAS thanks to all the biosludge dumping in my area? I can’t know. I haven’t tested. But I shouldn’t have to – if farmers won’t stop dumping biosludge on their property, the state should stop them. It’s the only way to ensure consumers that “farm fresh” actually means what it implies.

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