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Update, Jan. 29, 2026: The case against Nick Tilsen ended in a mistrial on Jan. 28, after three days of testimony. The jury was not able to reach a unanimous verdict. Read more here.

Indigenous leader Nick Tilsen is set to face trial in Pennington County, South Dakota, starting Jan. 26, as he maintains that the case against him is politically motivated and aimed at suppressing Indigenous organizing. 

Tilsen is the founder and CEO of NDN Collective, the largest Indigenous-led philanthropy and power-building organization in the U.S. He is also Oglala Lakota, born and raised on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. 

Tilsen is charged with aggravated assault, simple assault of a police officer, and obstruction of a police officer. If found guilty, Tilsen could face up to 26 years in prison. The trial comes nearly four years after an encounter with the Rapid City Police Department, which Tilsen and the department recount differently. 

Tilsen told Prism that on June 11, 2022, he had attempted what he called a routine “cop watch”—a kind of informal civilian observation of police officers. He observed Rapid City police officers detaining an unhoused man, whom Tilsen believed to be Indigenous. The officers surrounded Tilsen’s car and ordered him to get out, he said. He refused, saying his actions were legal. Shortly after, Tilsen said that he requested to speak to a police supervisor, who then instructed the officers to allow him to leave. 

More than a year after the encounter, the Pennington County prosecutor brought charges against Tilsen and issued a warrant for his arrest. The warrant was issued days before a July 4 protest led by NDN Collective addressing police killings of Indigenous peoples in South Dakota and speaking directly to the impunity of the Rapid City Police Department and the Pennington County Sheriff’s Department. 

On Jan. 12, 2026, two weeks before Tilsen’s trial date, a grand jury approved a third charge of simple assault of a law enforcement officer.

“You can’t say these [charges] are not politically motivated,” Tilsen told Prism during a recent call. “They wanted to discourage me from organizing. They wanted to try to paint me to be a criminal. They wanted to try to paint me to be something that I’m not.” 

A petition championing Tilsen’s innocence has garnered nearly 22,000 signatures as of Monday. 

The office of Pennington County State’s Attorney Lara Roetzel did not respond to Prism’s request for comment. 

In 2023, when the county first charged Tilsen, Roetzel denied any political premeditation. “It certainly looks like this is calculated given Mr. Tilsen’s involvement in NDN Collective and given the fact that we know NDN Collective is going to be protesting … on the Fourth of July,” Roetzel said at the time. “It really is just a coincidence, no one is above the law, Mr. Tilsen committed this crime, we activated the warrant just like we would for anyone else.” 

Rapid City police also did not provide responses to Prism’s questions and refused to provide arrest reports relating to Tilsen’s case under a South Dakota law that exempts law enforcement documents from public records requests.

Meanwhile, Tilsen’s supporters have continued speaking out against his charges. 

“While we hoped the charges against Nick would be dropped, we have confidence the trial will finally prove his innocence,” Wizipan Little Elk Garriott, NDN Collective president, said in a press release. “In the meantime, NDN Collective will continue our work to build Indigenous power and serve the Rapid City community and beyond.”

“The lengthy and convoluted nature of this case demonstrates how far those threatened by strong Indigenous leaders will go to try and silence us,”elder and community leader Norma Rendon said in the press release. “We will not back down, and look forward to supporting Nick as he continues navigating the legal process.”

Over-policed communities

Indigenous peoples are over-policed and incarcerated at double the national rate. In South Dakota, Indigenous peoples comprise 8% of the state’s population but account for 35% of those in prisons and 47% of those in jails. South Dakota’s population is just under 1 million people and it incarcerates 812 per 100,000 people, which according to Prison Policy Initiative means that the state “locks up a higher percentage of its people than any independent democratic country on earth.”

Robust research has drawn the causal connections between income level, educational attainment, access to social services, and imprisonment rates. Indigenous peoples contend with lower incomes, less access to well-funded and culturally relevant education, and suffer greater levels of environmental pollution, among other determinants of health. Scholars say that historical stereotyping of Indigenous peoples have contributed to disproportionate policing and incarceration rates. 

It’s also not uncommon for law enforcement to target movement leaders and activists, especially those who are Black and brown. The policing, surveillance, and jailing of activists involved in the Black Power Movement, American Indian Movement (AIM), and other leaders in the civil rights movement were key reasons that struggles for codified rights stalled by the late 1970s and 1980s, according to scholars. 

NDN Collective played a significant role in advocating for the release of Leonard Peltier, an enrolled tribal member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa who organized with AIM and was incarcerated for the killing of two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in 1975. Peltier’s sentence was commuted in 2025 by then-President Joe Biden after being incarcerated in federal prison for 48 years.

Speaking out against injustice has brought increased scrutiny in recent years. Efforts by law enforcement and elected officials to suppress or quell dissent continue to climb in the U.S. NDN and other advocates say the Trump administration policies have expanded law enforcement authority, citing incidents around stalking, kidnapping, and killing people without due process, and encouraging officers to act with criminal immunity. 

“We stand undeterred”

Tilsen told Prism that the upcoming trial hasn’t swayed his convictions. “I’m not intimidated by the prosecutors,” Tilsen said. “I know what I’m doing is for my people. I know what I’m doing is for the future of my children and my future grandchildren.” 

Tilsen is among activists and elected officials who have publicly criticized the Trump administration’s policies. Just last week, the Department of Justice (DOJ) subpoenaed Minnesota’s Democratic Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis’ Democratic Mayor Jacob Frey—likely for comments made about Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) militaristic descent into Minneapolis. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is now going after Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly for comments he made in a public video encouraging members of the military to refuse illegal orders. On Jan. 22, the DOJ announced that it would be pressing charges against former Minneapolis NAACP chapter President and civil rights attorney Nekima Levy Armstrong for protesting ICE at a church service. 

The pursuit of Tilsen is significant in that he does not hold public office and regularly speaks out against the very institutions that are now charging him, including the county sheriff’s office and police department. 

“I think it’s important for us that when we’re faced with tyranny and when we’re faced with charges like this, that we stand proud, that we stand dignified, and that we stand undeterred,” Tilsen said.

Correction, Jan. 26: This story has been update to state that Biden commuted Peltier’s sentence in 2025 and that Peltier was incarcerated in federal prison for 48 years.

Editorial Team:
Sahar Fatima, Lead Editor
Carolyn Copeland, Top Editor
Rashmee Kumar, Copy Editor