Standoff: Standing Rock, the Bundy Movement, and the American Story of Sacred Lands

"A powerful, illuminating book."
—LOUISE ERDRICH, author of The Night Watchman

Native young people and elders pray in sweat lodges at the Océti Sakówin camp, the North Dakota landscape outside blanketed in snow. In Oregon, white men and women in army surplus and western gear, some draped in the American flag, gather in the buildings of the Malheur Wildlife Refuge. The world witnessed two standoffs in 2016: the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe's protest against an oil pipeline in North Dakota and the armed takeover of Oregon's Malheur Wildlife Refuge led by the Bundy family. These events unfolded in vastly different ways, from media coverage to the reactions of law enforcement. In Standoff, Jacqueline Keeler examines these episodes as two sides of the same story that created America and its deep–rooted cultural conflicts.

2022 High Plains Book Award Finalist

"Eye–opening and compelling…required reading for those who would call this land home."
—KIRKUS REVIEWS

The Bundy takeover of Oregon's Malheur Wildlife Refuge and the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe's standoff against an oil pipeline in North Dakota are two sides of the same story that created America and its deep-rooted cultural conflicts. Through a compelling comparison of conflicting beliefs and legal systems, Keeler explores whether the West has really been won—and for whom.