Nick Estes is a Sicangu American community organizer, journalist, and historian at the University of Minnesota. He has cofounded The Red Nation and Red Media. After the Dakota Access Pipeline protests in 2016-2017, Estes met controversy for allegedly misusing money donated to his organization which was meant to go to protestors. In 2019, he was awarded the Lannan Literary Award Fellowship for nonfiction. In 2020, he was honored as the Marguerite Casey Foundation's freedom scholar.