Climate activists disrupt 13 Seattle Chase bank branches The protesters decry the bank's funding of oil pipelines

Photo: JOE DYER An Occupy Seattle protester demonstrates in front of a Chase bank...

About 26 people, including a Seattle City Council candidate, were arrested midday Monday during a dozen occupations of local Chase bank branches as an environmental protest.

Chase is one of two lead banks financing the Keystone XL pipeline that has drawn ire from climate activists who are pushing to prevent completion of the tar sands oil pipeline that will funnel oil exports from Canada through the United States.

Former President Barack Obama rejected the construction of the latest phase of the pipeline, but the Trump administration supports its completion.

Climate activists 350 Seattle issued a demand letter two weeks earlier pledging to occupy Chase bank locations if they did not withdraw their support of the pipeline project by Monday.

As a result, a Capitol Hill branch did not open its doors to prevent an occupation and protesters flooded 12 more locations in the city.

350 Seattle collaborated with Mazaska Talks, an anti-pipeline group that has also supported divestment from Wells Fargo for its financial ties with the Dakota Access Pipeline that drew encampments of protesters during the winter.

Seattle police say they fielded several 911 calls from Chase branches between 11 a.m. and noon to report people blocking entrances or refusing to leave the bank. Officers monitored the demonstrations for more than an hour. Police say they gave protesters several chances to leave about 1 p.m. and that they could be arrested if they did not do so -- some even requested to be arrested, they claim.

Demonstrators were arrested for trespassing, obstruction or pedestrian interference.

Jon Grant, an at-large candidate for Seattle City Council, was photographed as one of the arrestees -- the moment was shared by his Facebook page.

Protesters left some locations, but other locations were closed down by the activists, including the branches in Fremont and Seattle University, according to Mazaska Talks and Johnston.

Johnston hopes the civil disobedience will help educate the public on the environmental threat of tar sands oil and encourage Chase customers to switch banks.

"We didn't believe that Chase would actually stop funding these projects because we asked them to," she said, adding that she wants activists to help make pipeline support "as toxic as the actual projects are."

"If we let bus continue with things going the way they are ... we know that leads to catastrophe," Johnston said.