Dave Foreman

Dave Foreman

Dave Foreman is a radical environmental activist and co-founder of Earth First!.

Activism

Interested in the environment since childhood, Dave Foreman (born 1947) began taking up the cause of wilderness protection in the very early 1970s when he worked for The Wilderness Society, and then later, the New Mexico chapter of The Nature Conservancy. But Foreman soon found himself disillusioned with the “professionalism” of the movement around the environment.

With a group of friends, Foreman coined the phrase “Earth First!” while on a hiking trip in April of 1980. From this phrase came the movement, which cast itself action-wise in stark contrast to any of the more sedate lobbying efforts that had marked Foreman’s career in environmental politics prior to 1980. Now, the movement would leverage a tactic they called “monkeywrenching,” which involved sabotage at the level of industry, taking their cue from historical labor struggles from decades past.

Eventually, as the Earth First! group began to take on members whose politics were more in line with Marxists and Anarchists, Foreman again found himself disillusioned and not totally in line with the movement. He was arrested on a charge of conspiracy in 1990 by the FBI, along with 5 others who were suspected of plotting to sabotage a power line connecting to a water pumping station in Arizona, plead guilty to a misdemeanor and received a suspended sentence.

Following that 1990 arrest, Foreman stepped down from his post as acting spokesperson of the group, and started the Wildlands Project, which aims to establish a network of protected North American wilderness. He also served on the board of the Sierra Club in the mid-90s.

The Human Pox

In his 1991 book "Confessions of an Eco-Warrior," Dave Foreman wrote that "...human overpopulation is the fundamental problem on Earth today," and "In our decimation of biological diversity, in our production of toxins, in our attack on the basic life-support system of Earth, in our explosive population growth, we humans have become a disease – the Humanpox"

Radical environmentalists

New Mexico Senator Martin Heinrich founded an environmentalist group with a convicted eco-terrorist in the 1990s.

Heinrich was elected to the Senate in 2012 with the financial backing of numerous environmentalist groups.

Prior to his political career, Heinrich co-founded and chaired the New Mexico Wilderness Alliance. Dave Foreman, a convicted criminal and founder of the radical environmental “warrior society” Earth First!, was among the other co-founders of the group. He also sat on the board during Heinrich’s tenure as chairman.

Foreman pled guilty to conspiring to sabotage a nuclear power plant and has openly advocated for monkey-wrenching and other forms of “environmental espionage,” according to documents. Other Earth First! members also served on the board Heinrich chaired, including Foreman’s wife Nancy Morton and Todd Schulke, according to a 2001 Wilderness Alliance newsletter.

Foreman pled guilty in 1991 to conspiracy to damage the property of an energy facility in an Earth First! attempt to destroy an electrical transmission line leading to a nuclear power plant, according to a report funded by the U.S. Department of Justice entitled “Pre-Incident Indicators of Terrorist Incidents: The Identification of Behavioral, Geographic, and Temporal Patterns of Preparatory Conduct.”

Foreman’s guilty plea occurred years before the earliest verifiable evidence of his working relationship with Heinrich, who now sits on the Senate Energy Committee. The New Mexico Wilderness Alliance was formed in 1997, according to the groups website.

In his writings, Foreman has said that “World War III has already begun, and that is the war of industrial humans against the Earth.” He has also advocated for ”civil disobedience” and “environmental espionage,” and coached his followers in the methods of “conscious lawbreaking.”

New Mexico Wilderness Alliance meetings took place in Foreman’s home, where Heinrich was a frequent guest, according to a source close to the New Mexico environmentalist community.

Foreman’s wife, Morton, made multiple financial contributions to Heinrich’s 2012 Senate campaign, totaling $1,750.

Earth First! ran a campaign of environmentally motivated 'eco-tage' in the 1990s and 2000s. Among its initiatives was an unfulfilled plot to destroy power lines leading to a nuclear power plant.

Foreman, then Earth First!'s leader, pleaded guilty to conspiring in that plot. The New Mexico Wilderness Alliance was founded six years later, in 1997.

By that time, Foreman's criminal charge had been reduced from felony conspiracy to the misdemeanor crime of vandalism to government property. That arrangement was dependent on five years of good behavior. He later paid a $250 fine.

In a documentary film titled Earth First!: The Politics Of Radical Environmentalism, Foreman spelled out his green pressure philosophy.

'We aren't fooled for a minute that we’re engaged in the liberal reform,' he said. 'We're sticking a wrench in the system, we're slowing it down, we're thwarting it, we’re kicking it in the face.'

That 'monkey wrenching' philosophy often extended to the personal lives of business and government leaders who the group saw as putting economic progress ahead of the planet.

'The earth is not dying,' its official motto read. 'It is being killed. And those who are killing it have names and addresses.'

The group put out several hit lists during the 1990s and 2000s, including one in its newsletter, the Earth First! Journal, that spelled out the names and addresses of biotechnology executives involved with the genetic modification of food crops.

New Mexico Wilderness Alliance board members

2001;

• Martin Heinrich, Chair Thoreau, NM
• Todd Schulke, V. Chair Silver City, NM
• Randall Gray, Treasurer Lake Valley, NM
• Nancy Morton, Secretary Albuquerque, NM
• Rick Aster Socorro, NM
• Jim Baca Albuquerque, NM
• Pam Eaton Denver, CO
• Dave Foreman Albuquerque, NM
• Bob Howard Santa Fe, NM
• Wes Leonard El Paso, TX
• Dave Parsons Albuquerque, NM
• Arian Pregenzer Albuquerque, NM
• Jeff Regenold Santa Fe, NM
• Steve West Carlsbad, NM