It’s possible you’ve heard the phrase “Protect Oak Flat” in recent years, or maybe you’ve seen it in a mural, or scrawled in a piece of graffiti on a Phoenix wall. Well, the battle over Oak Flat is in its final stage, and its fate lies in the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Apache Stronghold is fighting to stop a copper mine from blowing up a sacred mountain. The Supreme Court may be their last hope

The Petitions of the Week column highlights some of the cert petitions recently filed in the Supreme Court. A list of all petitions we’re watching is available here.

The prayer journey will pass through other tribal communities threatened by resource extraction while trying to stop a mine that claims it could satisfy a quarter of the U.S. demand for copper.

Grassroots group Apache Stronghold took the next step in its fight to prevent a proposed copper mine from destroying Oak Flat, one of the Apache peoples' most sacred sites, asking the entire 29-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to review its lawsuit.

“Religious freedom” is having a moment in federal courts. One of the big successful goals of the conservative legal movement was that religious freedom would be advanced in a way that it supposedly had not been before.

PHOENIX (AP) — An Apache group that has fought to protect land it considers sacred from a copper mining project in central Arizona suffered a significant blow Friday when a divided federal court panel voted 6-5 to uphold a lower court’s denial of a preliminary injunction to halt the transfer of land for the project.

This year's run held special significance, as both mine opponents and backers await a pivotal decision from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Last March, the court heard arguments in Apache Stronghold's litigation to stop a proposed copper mine at Oak Flat, a project that would destroy one of the Apache peoples' most sacred sites.