Words from the NoDAPL Political Prisoners (short video):
The NoDAPL Political Prisoner Support Committee members consist of sentenced federal defendants/Water Protectors Michael Little Feather Giron, Michael Rattler Markus, RedFawn Fallis, Dion Ortiz, and James Angry Bird White, along with their family members and members from their legal teams.
We work to ensure Angry Bird, Dion, RedFawn, Little Feather, and Rattler hold the reins to coordinating their own support while facing court, imprisonment, and probation; we aid them to keep direct connection to the outside while incarcerated; we continue to provide legal support and advocacy through the coming years while enduring incarceration in prison, halfway houses and probation; we enable their work and prayer as protectors to continue within prison walls; we focus on advocating and informing the public about the reality of their political imprisonment so their sacrifices are not made in vain.
OUR PRIORITIES:
- NoDAPL political prisoners, their families, and their legal teams have a responsibility to tell truths of pertinent lessons learned from the NoDAPL struggle as part of the broader struggle related to collective resistance, indigenous sovereignty, land and water rights, political imprisonment, prison aboliton, legal defense for radical movement work, corporate violence, settler colonialism, decolonization, and security culture. The NoDAPL camps set a new precedence of confronting escalation of militarized police, mercenaries and federal agencies, with new legislation protecting corporate interest and further criminalizing collective resistance towards extractive industry. There are truths and hard lessons learned of how the colonial State targeted these 5 Water Protectors with federal prosecution, incarceration, surveillance, attempts to divide and conquer, and snitch jacketing, as well as provide the context of the continuation of these realities toward indigenous nations that began with settler colonialism on Turtle Island 500+ years ago.
- We refuse to have NoDAPL political prisoners silenced. The incarceration of Water Protectors has prevented their stories from being told; gag orders have prevented our legal teams and families from telling certain truths until court cases were finalized; social media campaigns struggle with outreach to be a vehicle for tangible support or advocacy, while simultaneously dealing with social media's rumors and disinformation. Each political prisoner has their own circumstances of how and why they were targeted by the federal government for work they engaged in as water protectors; each defendant deserves our time for them to be heard. We need spaces, events, time, and other outlets to be offered and coordinated with us for advocacy of Water Protectors incarcerated in federal prison, targeted by federal indictments in colonial courts as blatant examples of political imprisonment.
- We demand to limit the attempts of misguided intervention and blatant exploitation of NoDAPL political prisoners. It's a bitter reality that multiple NoDAPL political prisoners have had their name, image, and struggle used by people with ulterior motives. This support committee ensures direct coordination with NoDAPL political prisoners; the public can offer their support, resources, and networking, as well as ensuring financial support goes directly to them through prison commissary or through other means that incarcerated Water Protectors organized themselves.
- It is out of love as family to tend to their needs while incarcerated in prisons, at halfway houses, and under continual federal surveillance on probation. Many members of this support committee are water protectors themselves who not only lived in camp long-term, but committed ourselves to on the ground support during the entirety of these 5 Water Protector's federal trials and incarceration. We have remained in the NoDAPL resistance as it's continued on behind prison walls. We have essential experience regarding the hardships of prisoner support that we want to share with others, and seek to work in solidarity with people and groups that also engage in support of political prisoners.
- Legal defense cannot be centered in the same context as usual court proceedings when defending against political imprisonment, as state tactics and motives differ. We seek to spread necessary knowledge regarding the methods and mayhem of federal prosecution and how it pertains to collective resistance with the state's attempted repression of direct action, land liberation, and indigenous sovereignty. Our Support Committee directly confronts the colonial state's false narrative regarding the actions/roles of these 5 Water Protectors when they lived in the NoDAPL camps, as well as confronting other false accounts of what generally occurred in the NoDAPL camps. We also offer the perspective of solidarity in court through collective defense strategy, meaning co-defendants support each other with their defense teams strategizing together.
You can contact the support committee at
You can also contact a point person:
Rattler's support committee contact:
̶L̶i̶t̶t̶l̶e̶ ̶F̶e̶a̶t̶h̶e̶r̶'̶s̶ ̶s̶u̶p̶p̶o̶r̶t̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶m̶i̶t̶t̶e̶e̶ ̶c̶o̶n̶t̶a̶c̶t̶:̶ ̶f̶r̶e̶e̶l̶i̶t̶t̶l̶e̶f̶e̶a̶t̶h̶e̶r̶@̶p̶r̶o̶t̶o̶n̶m̶a̶i̶l̶.̶c̶o̶m̶
Angry Bird's support committee contact:
Dion's support committee contact:
RedFawn's support committee contact:
Unitarian Universalist (UU) coordination: