Water is Life: #NoDAPL Never Ended

Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) still operates beneath Lake Oahe, the primary drinking water source for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. Nearly ten years after the world watched Standing Rock rise to defend the Missouri River, the legal fight continues. Many people remember the camps, the militarized response, and the words that traveled from Standing Rock to the world: Mni Wiconi, Water Is Life. But fewer know what followed.

In 2020, a federal court vacated DAPL’s easement under Lake Oahe after finding the government’s environmental review inadequate. The pipeline did not shut down, rather, it continued operating without the required easement across federal land while litigation continued and environmental review dragged on. In May 2026, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced approval of a second easement, creating a new phase of the legal struggle. And while public attention moved elsewhere, the threat to water did not. The questions at the center of Standing Rock did not disappear either: Who bears the risk of fossil fuel infrastructure? Whose drinking water is considered expendable? What happens when environmental law, regulatory process, and corporate power align against Indigenous Peoples and the places we are bound to protect?

Our Work & Approach

Water Protector Legal Collective (WPLC) was born from the #NoDAPL movement. It is there where we organized legal representation for hundreds of Water Protectors at Standing Rock. Today, we continue this work as part of the legal team representing the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in the fight against DAPL and in defense of water, Treaty rights, sacred places, and future generations.

WPLC serves as a legal holding line for Indigenous Peoples and the Earth. We provide legal defense, strategic advocacy, research, and community legal education to communities confronting extraction and environmental harm. At Standing Rock, this includes ongoing legal representation related to DAPL operations, environmental review, and development of a People’s Environmental Impact Statement, a community- and Indigenous-informed response to processes that have minimized risk and obscured harms to water, cultural sites, and Treaty-protected interests. Standing Rock reflects a broader pattern across Indigenous territories: extractive projects advanced through incomplete review, regulatory systems that normalize harm, and corporate reliance on secrecy, delay, and legal complexity. Our response is to build legal strategies that expand access to legal knowledge, strengthen community defense, challenge opacity, and advance Indigenous rights and environmental accountability.

The Challenge

Nearly ten years after Standing Rock, DAPL still operates beneath Lake Oahe, the primary drinking water source for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. The pipeline’s continued operation tells a larger story about how extraction works in the United States: prolonged environmental review, regulatory delay, incomplete disclosure, and legal systems that too often place the burden of defense on Indigenous Peoples and frontline communities. Even after a federal court vacated DAPL’s easement in 2020, the pipeline continued operating while legal and regulatory processes continued to unfold. In May 2026, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved a second easement, opening a new chapter in the fight to protect water and hold decision-makers accountable.

While public attention moved on, the underlying conditions did not. Standing Rock continues to confront risks to drinking water, Treaty rights, sacred sites, and environmental integrity. More broadly, Indigenous Peoples and environmental defenders face a political landscape marked by deregulation, accelerated fossil fuel development, attacks on environmental protections, and increasing pressure on those who resist extraction.

The Opportunity 

Support from Ma Earth would directly strengthen WPLC’s legal work supporting the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in the #NoDAPL fight that galvanized the world – and never ended. Funding will support our ongoing efforts to challenge DAPL operations and protect drinking water, legal strategy, litigation support, expert coordination, community education, and advocacy materials. 

As new legal and regulatory battles emerge, Standing Rock remains one of the most important tests of these questions in our time. The outcome will extend far beyond a single pipeline, shaping how Indigenous rights, environmental review, community consent, and environmental accountability are understood and applied in future struggles over extraction and infrastructure.

Flexible support is essential because environmental defense work rarely follows predictable timelines. Court rulings shift, agencies act, new information emerges, and community priorities evolve. Communities need trusted partners capable of responding with urgency, integrity, and long-term commitment. Sustained support helps ensure that legal advocacy, research, public education, and community-centered defense can continue wherever and whenever they are needed, strengthening the long-term capacity of Indigenous communities to protect water, defend their rights, and hold decision-makers accountable.

Tracking Impact

This project will be carried out through sustained legal strategy, research, advocacy, and close coordination with Standing Rock Sioux Tribe leadership, legal counsel, technical experts, and community partners. We will monitor litigation developments, environmental review processes, research outputs, educational resources, and advocacy efforts related to DAPL and protection of drinking water, Treaty rights, and sacred sites. Strategies will continue to evolve in response to court rulings, agency actions, emerging information, and community priorities.

We will also track project outputs such as legal filings and advocacy milestones, research and public education materials produced, meetings and consultations held, and community legal education efforts supported. At the same time, we recognize that the impact of long-term legal defense extends beyond measurable outputs alone. We will also look to impacts that numbers alone cannot capture: stronger access to legal knowledge and strategy, greater public understanding of DAPL and its consequences, preservation of movement memory, and the enduring capacity of communities to protect water and navigate systems built to wear them down. Our approach remains rooted in Indigenous-led defense of water and long-term relationship. Community knowledge and lived realities will continue to shape how the work evolves.

Our Experience

WPLC brings nearly a decade of experience supporting Indigenous-led environmental and human rights advocacy through legal defense, strategic advocacy, public education, research, and movement support. Born from the #NoDAPL movement at Standing Rock, we organized legal representation for hundreds of Water Protectors and continue today as part of the legal team supporting the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in ongoing efforts related to DAPL. Our work has since expanded to include protection of environmental defenders, international Indigenous rights advocacy, and partnerships with Tribal Nations, Indigenous leaders, attorneys, organizers, researchers, and grassroots movements across the United States and internationally.

A cornerstone of our work is preserving and sharing movement memory. In 2026, WPLC published For the Love of Water, a landmark retrospective documenting ten years of Standing Rock and the broader #NoDAPL movement through legal history, community memory, and frontline experience. Projects like this help safeguard lessons, strategies, and stories that future generations of land and water defenders can draw upon.

Together, our longstanding relationships, legal experience, and deep roots in the Standing Rock movement provide the trust, knowledge, and commitment necessary to continue supporting the Tribe’s ongoing efforts to protect drinking water, uphold Treaty rights, and defend future generations. 

 Please see our 2024 Annual Report for more information.