After a protracted series of delays, we continue to await the long-promised draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for the Dakota Access pipeline (DAPL). In today’s Water Wars video — produced as always by us in partnership with the Standing Rock Nation and Great Plains Tribal Water Alliance — we take you inside a May meeting between tribal leaders and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. You’ll see our frustration: none of Standing Rock’s serious concerns about DAPL have yet been addressed, and both the tribe and public must soon be given the ability to review and provide input on the environmental impacts of the dangerous and illegal pipeline.

Watch The Army Corps doesn’t have any answers for us. It’s time for them to face the music!

You probably know the history. Late in 2016, President Obama heard the call of thousands and halted construction on DAPL, citing the requirement of the National Environmental Policy Act that a full environmental assessment be done. But Trump greenlit the project in violation of federal law as soon as he took office. Now DAPL crosses the Missouri River and our treaty lands with no effective plan, as far as we’ve seen, for handling a spill.

And we know the current DEIS process is a sham. Environmental Resources Management (ERM), the company tapped by the Army Corps of Engineers to prepare the study, is a member of the American Petroleum Institute. And that body filed a legal brief in support of DAPL in Standing Rock’s lawsuit against the Army Corps. That’s an obvious conflict of interest.

The Army Corps has routinely ignored Standing Rock’s many critical concerns, and that’s why we’re counting on you when the public comment period finally opens. That could be any week now. No matter what, please stay ready to demand that the Army Corps procure a new EIS prepared by an impartial party — and shut this pipeline down.

Wopila tanka — thank you, as ever, for standing with Standing Rock.
Chase Iron Eyes
Co-Director and Lead Counsel
The Lakota People’s Law Project