Bodies of Indian boarding school students make their journey home

More than 130 years ago, three Oglala Lakota youths from the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota traveled by train to the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania.

But James Cornman, Samuel Flying Horse (also known as Tasunke Kinyela) and Fannie Charging Shield, like dozens of other Carlisle students, contracted tuberculosis, a disease that thrived in crowded school dormitories. They were buried in the school cemetery until this week, when a delegation from Pine Ridge arrived to take them home.

The car carrying their remains returned to South Dakota, making stops at the Yankton and Rosebud reservations before traveling in a procession through Pine Ridge.

Amanda Takes War Bonnett-Beauvais, whose ancestor Thomas Marshall was also buried at Carlisle, was among those who gathered in the town of Martin to pay their respects.

“It's an event that's really emotionally sad, but at the same time, it's a really educational event because it brings forth what happened in the boarding school era,” she told VOA. “Even though it's a historical thing that had happened 130 years ago, the effects of what those kids, their families, endured are still ringing into our family infrastructures today.”

The children’s remains were taken to a reservation funeral home; tribe members and descendants will meet Monday to discuss where they will be buried.

Did feds use, dispose of toxic chemicals on Nevada reservation?

The Associated Press this week revealed evidence that the federal government may have used component chemicals of the toxic herbicide Agent Orange (AO) as weed control on the Duck Valley Indian Reservation in Nevada.

The Shoshone-Paiute tribes who make their home at Duck Valley have long struggled with widespread illness and cancer, which they believe is linked to contamination of soil and water by pesticides and other chemical waste.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) managed the reservation until 1993. During the 1950s, BIA operated a maintenance shop on the reservation and improperly disposed of diesel and other oils by pumping them into the earth through a shallow injection well.

Tests on samples from the sump, soil and floor drains around the building revealed that BIA had stored a dangerous assortment of chemicals, including waste oil, arsenic, copper, lead, cadmium and AO components.

Although new wells were installed in 1992, the community was exposed to contaminated water for years, leading to numerous cancer deaths, particularly among former school staff and students.

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Tribes lack resources to fight climate change along Pacific Northwest coastline

Over two dozen tribal nations along the Oregon and Washington coasts face climate challenges such as rising sea levels, ocean acidification, extreme heat, increased wildfire risk and declining mountain snowpack.

A recent report from the Tribal Coastal Resilience Portfolio of the Northwest Climate Resilience Collaborative shows that tribes have drawn up plans for combating extreme weather events, but they lack the funds, partnerships, technical assistance and personnel to put plans into action.

“Some of the challenges that we face on the coast are due to the magnitude of some of the projects that we need to undertake,” Quinault Indian Nation Natural Resources Technical Adviser Gary Morishima told the collaborative during one of a series of listening sessions conducted among more than a dozen Pacific Northwest tribes.

The Quinault tribe, for example, is working to relocate two villages vulnerable to climate change.

“That’s a multimillion-dollar, multiagency effort,” Morishima told the collaborative. “It’s very difficult to integrate our plans and priorities for village relocation with those of the agencies and constraints on available funding.”

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Crackdown on fake sober living homes push hundreds into Arizona streets

ProPublica and the Arizona Center for Investigative Journalism this week reported that a crackdown on fraudulent addiction facilities — so-called “sober living homes” — in the city of Phoenix has left hundreds of mostly Native American men and women homeless with no access to care.

As VOA reported in February 2023, fraudulent substance abuse providers targeted, lured and sometimes kidnapped Native Americans into sober homes across the city, billing Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS) for services never rendered.

In October 2023, AHCCCS suspended the licenses of 12 sober living centers, adding to the list of more than 300 centers shut down by the state in 2023 because of allegations of Medicare fraud.

Thirty of the providers accused of fraud have been cleared to reopen and once again bill Medicaid for reimbursements.

“This is far from over, Navajo activist Reva Stewart told VOA Wednesday. “People are still getting recruited. People are still dying.

She shared video (above) that she said shows a group of recruiters coercing an intoxicated man into a transport van.

“Every morning, just on my way to work, I see like 20 to 25 Native people just hanging out by the Indian hospital,” she said.

Operators of fraudulent sober homes are known to frequent the Phoenix Indian Health Center and other locations, luring addicts and the homeless with promises of a warm bed and treatment.

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North Carolina Cherokees open state’s only marijuana dispensary

The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina launched its first ever adult recreational marijuana sales on September 7, taking advantage of tribal sovereignty in a state where growing, possessing, using or selling cannabis products is illegal.

More than 4,000 customers showed up at the Great Smoky Cannabis Company in the Qualla Boundary; some waited in line for hours to purchase from a menu of 350 products.

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Montana Senate candidate accused of making racially charged remarks about Indians

Tim Sheehy, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Montana, is facing widespread criticism after the Flathead Reservation's Char-Koosta News this week published four audio clips in which the candidate appears to have made "racially tinged comments" about Native Americans on the Crow Reservation in Montana.

During a November 2023 fundraising event, Sheehy spoke about branding and roping cattle on the Crow Reservation alongside his Crow ranching partner, remarking that it was "a great way to bond with all the Indians being out there while they're drunk at 8 a.m."

During a separate event four days later, he described riding a horse in the Crow Reservation's annual parade, calling parade attendees a "tough crowd."

"They let you know if they like you or not. There's Coors Light [beer] cans flying by your head as you're riding by," the candidate said.

The Char-Koosta News reports it is working to verify the audio, and Sheehy's campaign has not issued any statement.

Levi Black Eagle, the Crow Nation's secretary for the executive branch, told Montana television station KTVQ that while Crows tolerate "good-natured ribbing," Sheehy's comments perpetuate old racist stereotypes.

"It's really disheartening, especially from an individual, a candidate running for such a high office, you would expect more from those individuals," Black Eagle said. "I think it's a majority of the community that fights hard to negate those stereotypes, and to have them perpetuate in such a way is just, it's really disgusting. And we don't stand for it."

The report has sparked outrage among other Native American communities in Montana, a state where Indigenous people make up about 6% of the population; they are calling for an apology.

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Arizona tribal enrollment numbers are valid proof of US citizenship

Voting advocacy groups in Arizona are working to clear up confusion over a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling that may discourage Native Americans from voting in November's general election.

Through an unsigned order, the Supreme Court on August 22 sided with the Republican National Committee and Republican lawmakers in Arizona, reinstating a law that requires voter registrants to prove their U.S. citizenship when filling out state voter registration forms.

The decision suggests that anyone registering to vote using state-issued voter registration forms must provide documentation of U.S. citizenship such as a birth certificate or valid passport.

Patty Ferguson-Bohnee, a law professor at Arizona State University, called the ruling "discouraging" but pointed out that Native Americans were automatically made citizens a century ago.

That means that Native voters in Arizona need only to provide their tribal enrollment numbers as proof.

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Nevada tribes seek to protect 19th-century massacre site

Native American tribes in Nevada are concerned about a new federal solar development plan that could affect the proposed Bahsahwahbee National Monument.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management's Western Solar Plan, released August 29, designates 4.8 million hectares in Nevada for solar projects, including areas near the site of the Bahsahwahbee monument. The site is historically significant, as it was the location of massacres of the Newe people in the 19th century and remains a sacred space for tribes that hold ceremonies there.

While the solar plan excludes certain Native American cultural sites, tribes worry that the lack of formal national monument status leaves Bahsahwahbee vulnerable to development.

"I am stunned and confused that while our tribes are in discussions with the Biden-Harris administration about establishing this monument, the BLM just issued a plan allowing the graves of our massacred ancestors to be bulldozed," said Amos Murphy, chair of the Confederated Tribes of the Goshute Reservation.

The Ely Shoshone, Duckwater Shoshone and Goshute tribes call the area Bahsahwahbee (Sacred Water Valley). Located near Nevada's Great Basin National Park, it is the site of three massacres in which the U.S. Army and armed vigilantes killed hundreds of their ancestors.

Efforts to secure national monument designation for the site are ongoing, with support from Nevada Senator Catherine Cortez Masto, a Democrat. Tribes are urging the Biden administration to take swift action to protect the area.

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Native Americans share stories about beings 'other than human'

South of the town of Toksook Bay on Nelson Island, Alaska, stands a hill known as Qasginguaq, which Yup'ik tradition says is the home of the Ircencerraat, beings described as "other than human."

"The young people that have seen them when they're playing state that they're about half their size," Toksook elder and cultural adviser Mark John told Native America Calling this week. "They have the ability to appear and disappear at will, and they live in a different dimension … if they appear to you in a human way out in the wilderness and they invite you to their home, spending a day at their home is like spending a year when you go back out."

John was among several guests and callers from across Indian Country this week who shared stories and traditions about "little people," beings that have parallels in cultures across the globe.

Listen here:

Tribes celebrate Klamath River dam removal

Construction crews on August 28 removed the fourth and final dam on the Klamath River in Oregon. As VOA’s Matt Dibble reports (below), Klamath, Yurok and Karuk Tribe were there to celebrate.

Cherokee Nation denies it helped enable trafficking of migrant children

Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin, Jr. has refuted allegations that Cherokee Federal, a division of the tribe’s business arm, Cherokee Nation Businesses, has played a role in the sex trafficking of migrant children at a California emergency intake facility.
"For over two years, Cherokee Nation and Cherokee Federal have been wrongly and unjustly smeared through unhinged conspiracy theories spread by a select few," Hoskin said.

In 2021, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services awarded Cherokee Federal a $706 million contract to process unaccompanied children at a facility in Pomona, California, and reunite them with families and/or sponsors.

Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA,) Bill Cassidy (R-LA,) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) hosted a roundtable discussion in Washington July 9 in which HHS whistleblowers Deborah White and Tara Rodas accused the HHS Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) and Cherokee Federal of prioritizing “speed over safety” in releasing unaccompanied minors.

They cited instances in which children were turned over to poorly or entirely unvetted “sponsors,” including criminals and, in one case, a member of the violent MS13 gang, despite an urgent “do not release advisory” which Rodas sent to HHS officials and Cherokee Federal staff.

Sen. James Lankford (R-OK), who serves on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, participated in that roundtable. During a recent community meeting in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, he denied that Cherokee Federal engaged in placing children in unsafe situations.

"During that hearing, I was talking about HHS and their decision-making and some of my colleagues were talking about Cherokee Federal," Lankford said. "I think that was unfair of how that was pulled in, because that wasn't their job for the final selection."

Cherokee Federal's job was to take care of the children after they crossed the border, Lankford said.

The New York Times in 2023 reported that the Biden administration had lost track of 85,000 children.

The Center for Public Integrity says that figure is misleading and only represents the number of children who could not be reached during follow-up welfare checks.

Senators to Agriculture Department: Act swiftly to restore food deliveries to Indian reservations

A bipartisan group of senators is urging the U.S. Department of Agriculture, or USDA, to address severe delays and issues in a federal food distribution program that delivers food to eligible households on Indian reservations and other designated areas. The program is known as the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations, or FDPIR.

“Families that participate in this program do so at the expense of being eligible to participate in other federal food assistance, like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP),” reads an August 23 letter to Agriculture Secretary Thomas Vilsack and signed by Senator Jeffrey Merkley (D-OR) and six Senate colleagues.

“Further, many Tribal households choose to participate in FDPIR over SNAP because they do not have access to grocery stores so families have limited options for assistance, should they face delays in their FDPIR deliveries.”

In March, the USDA consolidated the food delivery contractors to a single contractor in Kansas City, Missouri, over the objection of tribal leaders. Since then, deliveries have been sporadic, at best.

A tribal program director on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota spoke to VOA on condition of anonymity.

“The program usually serves 1,100-plus people a month; about a hundred of them are elders,” she said. “We usually get four to five trucks of food a month. But our May trucks were delayed, and by June, we ran out of meat and frozen foods. In July, we didn’t get our trucks until the end of the month.”

The FDPIR is billed as a supplemental food program, but for many families on the reservations, these deliveries make up their entire monthly food supply.

“We normally receive ours the third Monday of every month,” she added. “But in July, we didn't get our trucks until the end of the month, and we’re still waiting on our August deliveries.”

Some tribe members have the option of shopping off-reservation, using monthly, electronically-delivered SNAP benefits – that is, if they have transportation and can afford high supermarket prices.

“We also have a mobile vendor,” she said. “They come around the day before SNAP benefits come out. They charge whatever they want.”

Senate lawmakers have given the USDA until September 9 to report and document reasons for the delays. The USDA says it is working with the Missouri contractor to fix the backlog but tribal leaders say they aren’t working fast enough.

The Native American Caucus, meeting at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, opened its first meeting earlier this week with a prayer.

Amelia Flores, who chairs the Colorado River Indian Tribes in Arizona, introduced herself in the Mojave language and called on "Father, Creator" to bless Democrat leaders.

"We ask that you grant them wisdom and that our spirits will remain in a positive attitude throughout the next four days here. … We are gung-ho for our vice president and newly elect, with your favor, the first woman president of the United States," she said.

More than 150 Native American delegates representing tribes across the U.S. participated in the convention this week. They brought a unique set of concerns that include safeguarding tribal sovereignty, clarifying their relationship with the federal government and overcoming voting barriers.

Native vote power

Speaking with VOA in July, Association on American Indian Affairs Director Shannon O'Loughlin, a citizen of the Choctaw Nation in Oklahoma, emphasized that Native Americans have become an increasingly important voting bloc.

"If we do show up, and we do vote locally and nationally, we have the power to change the direction of the candidates and who's chosen," O'Loughlin said to VOA in July. "We saw that in the last election."

That said, she notes some states' efforts to discourage Native voters. In 2020, for example, the Native vote in Arizona helped swing the election in Biden's favor. Two years later, Republican lawmakers passed a law requiring Arizonans to prove U.S. citizenship, a hardship for many Native voters.

Lower courts rejected the law, and the Republican National Committee has called on the U.S. Supreme Court to decide in time for the state to begin printing ballots.

A look at the numbers

According to the Native American Rights Fund, out of nearly 6.8 million American Indians and Alaskan Natives, 4.7 million are older than 18 and registered to vote.

It is commonly assumed that Native American voters favor the Democratic Party. But some studies show otherwise:

Oklahoma State University researchers in 2016 conducted an internet poll in which 46% of Native American respondents identified as Democrats, 26% as Republicans and 25% as independents.

A 2022 Midterm Voter Election Poll by the African American Research Collaborative showed similar numbers but also revealed that Native American voters are less likely to believe either political party is truly committed to advancing their issues and priorities.

"We obviously want to look at the numbers, which are very interesting and important, but I think what's more telling at the end of the day is the fact that Native Americans are not really attached and don't have a solidified relationship with either party," said Gabriel Sanchez, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institute.

"Native American voters overwhelmingly tell us they're not really partisan in how they approach voting decisions. It's more a campaign season to campaign season evaluation of which party they perceive to be better for their communities," he noted.

Sanchez told VOA that Native Americans are usually represented, at least symbolically, in political conventions. He observed, however, little Native presence at the Republican convention in mid-July.

In contrast, Native Americans showed up in force at the Democratic convention this week to support Kamala Harris' bid for the White House, and they heard from prominent Democrats, including Governor Tim Walz (D-MN), the vice presidential nominee.

"We have 11 sovereign nations, Anishinaabe and Dakota, and our history in Minnesota, just like the rest across this country, is dark," he said. "But in Minnesota, we've acknowledged it's not just enough to admire a problem.

"What are you going to do to make a difference? What are you going to do to partner? What are you going to do to acknowledge the first Americans? And what are you going to do to understand that our state of Minnesota is stronger because of our 11 sovereign nations?"

Senator Corey Booker (D-NJ) expressed solidarity with Native voters, noting that Black and Native Americans face similar challenges "with a justice system that treats you better if you're rich and guilty than if you're poor and innocent, with a health care system where literally the lowest life expectancy in the nation is Native American and African American men."

But will these messages resonate with Native voters, particularly those registered as Independents?

"An issue that's nowhere near on the radar of either party's platform is missing and murdered Indigenous women," Sanchez told VOA, citing a First Nations Development Institute survey of Native Americans showing this to be a top concern.

"And I think if either the Democrat or Republican Party can embrace that particular issue, it will go a long way."