Frequently Asked Questions on Standing Rock Litigation
Why did Standing Rock bring a lawsuit?
The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe is deeply concerned about the construction of a major crude-oil pipeline that passes through its ancestral lands.
There are two broad issues. First, the pipeline would pass under the Missouri River (at Lake Oahe) just a half a mile upstream of the tribe’s reservation boundary, where a spill would be culturally and economically catastrophic. Second, the pipeline would pass through areas of great cultural significance, such as sacred sites and burial grounds that federal law seeks to protect.
The Tribe sued the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which is the primary federal agency that granted permits needed for the pipeline to be constructed...[The] pipeline company—Dakota Access, LLC—intervened in the lawsuit, making them a full party as well...
Dakota Access filed an unrelated lawsuit in late July against the Chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, one of the Tribe’s elected officials, and several other individuals, most of whom are not tribal members. Dakota Access claimed that these individuals were interfering with pipeline construction unlawfully.