Indigenous people 8 times more likely to be incarcerated than others (Canada)

  

KEEP READING:  https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/nunatsiavut-government-response-9.7155937 

Tribal leaders reflect on a year of uncertainty — and possibility

 

by Anna V. Smith, B. ‘Toastie’ Oaster, Chad Bradley and Sunnie R. Clahchischiligi, High Country News
April 9, 2026

Over a year into the second Trump administration, Indigenous communities have seen dramatic changes, from rescinding land-management policies that were more inclusive of Indigenous knowledge and reducing $1.5 billion in climate funding for tribal initiatives to removing tribal flags from Veterans Affairs hospitals. The administration has regularly bypassed tribal consultation or rolled back the work the previous administration did in partnership with tribes.

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To better understand the on-the-ground impacts, High Country News reporters and editors spoke with the leaders of intertribal coalitions, commissions and Native-run community organizations across the Western U.S. Tribal leaders described the haphazard changes that affected their funding and staffing amid an atmosphere of uncertainty, but a few also mentioned a sense of possibility: While some changes have caused irrevocable community harm, there are also unexpected opportunities within the disruption — opportunities to reflect, remember their elders and to make new choices with the generations to come in mind.

These conversations have been edited for length and clarity.

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Click to read about tribal leaders' experiences during this time

Autumn Gillard (Southern Paiute)

Coordinator for the Grand Staircase Escalante Intertribal Coalition

During his first term, President Donald Trump shrank Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by half. Last spring, the five tribes with ancestral lands within Grand Staircase-Escalante formed an intertribal coalition to better advocate for the monument and ensure that their perspectives were included in its management under a second Trump administration. In early March, Republican members of Congress sought to repeal the monument resource management plan that had been approved under the Biden administration.

Location: Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, Utah

“The groundwork actually started in 2019 to establish the coalition. A previous cultural manager from one of the tribes said we really need to have a tribal coalition for this monument, so that Indigenous voices can be heard.

“The resource management plan prior to 2020 did not include Indigenous voices in the management of our ancestral landscape, and so we had worked diligently as the coalition to make sure that we were putting comments in for this new process for the resource management plan that was approved in January of 2025.

“The (congressional actions) would severely impact the process that tribes had taken to integrate our traditional ecological knowledge into the commenting process for this management plan. It could also prohibit a future Resource Management Plan — maybe there wouldn't even be one. It would diminish all of the consultation that was held between the government and tribes. We worked so hard, and we have some individuals that have worked on these comments that are no longer with us. We’re not going to be able to re-retrieve that beautiful cultural knowledge.”

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Cody Desautel (Colville)

President of the Intertribal Timber Council

The Intertribal Timber Council, which comprises some 50 tribal nations, is focused on the management of forests, fire and natural resources. 

Location: Colville Reservation, Washington

“The Department of Interior fire reorganization has us concerned. The structure and how the leadership gets built out will be important in ensuring that they understand Indian Country; what some of their responsibilities will be for protecting tribal trust resources and then how they navigate (contracting with tribal governments), which will be new to most of them. There’s a lot of unknowns going into this fire season.

“With the reduction of the workforce in the U.S. Forest Service, and particularly under the leadership of the new chief, there seems to be a renewed objective to partner with tribes. We’ve got several bills working through Congress now that would expand tribal co-management authorities on adjacent federal land, and we've had some discussions about what shared stewardship agreements might look like. There's as much tribal-specific legislation moving through Congress as any point I've seen in my career.

“We always tend to pivot, recognizing where we’ve got opportunities with any given administration, and sometimes we pick up one political agenda with a change and then set down one that we worked on in the past. From a forestry and fire perspective, typically there’s a lot of alignment with those, and so we seem to be able to maintain some of the momentum that we’ve gained in past Congresses. 

“I think there’s always opportunity, even when there’s change. One of the best things that has come out of this administration is the focus on partnerships. Downsizing the federal government has impacts to us; it also creates opportunity when they're looking to have other partners do some of that work. I think tribes are situated to do that.”

KEEP READING: https://www.hcn.org/articles/tribal-leaders-reflect-on-a-year-of-uncertainty-and-possibility/

This article first appeared on High Country News and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. 

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Native lands have become the latest target for Big Tech

READ:  https://ictnews.org/news/in-indian-country-data-centers-come-with-a-familiar-threat-of-colonialism-these-organizers-are-fighting-back/

Canadian government has decided to end funding for MMIWG2S+

 

Indigenous Groups on Ending of Some Federal MMIWG Supports – April 8, 2026 -  👉click CPAC

Escape from Psychiatry

An Essay on the Locked Door Between You and a Drug-Free Life

Unbekoming Apr 10

You changed your diet. You found a naturopath. You stopped filling prescriptions you never understood and started asking questions your GP couldn’t answer. One afternoon you walked out of the clinic where you’d been a patient for fifteen years, and you didn’t go back. Nobody stopped you. Nobody called. The transition from one paradigm to another was, in the end, unremarkable. You found a different practitioner who spoke a language that made more sense, and you moved on.

Now imagine doing that on 40mg of paroxetine.

You can’t. And the reason you can’t reveals something about psychiatry that separates it from every other branch of medicine: the treatment itself locks you in. Not metaphorically. Chemically.

A person who decides their GP’s approach to cholesterol or blood pressure is wrong can simply stop taking the statin or the ACE inhibitor, experience some rebound effects, and move on. The decision is uncomfortable but it’s a decision. A person on psychiatric drugs — antidepressants, antipsychotics, benzodiazepines, mood stabilisers — faces a problem that is not comparable. Their brain has been physically restructured by the medication. Stopping it is not a decision. It is an ordeal that can last months or years, that can produce symptoms worse than anything that brought them to psychiatry in the first place, and that the entire medical system is designed to interpret as proof that the drugs were needed all along.

READ: https://open.substack.com/pub/unbekoming/p/escape-from-psychiatry?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email 

Rhythms of the Heart (video)

 David Moses Bridges, a nationally recognized Maine Passamaquoddy craftsman, fights to preserve his heritage, culture, and family while battling a rare form of cancer. Told through intimate and touching interviews, indigenous artistry, and original music.

Mapping Violence of Missing Murdered

Wisconsin woman teams with MIT to map violence against Indigenous people in Great Lakes region

https://www.wakingwomenhealingint.org/

  https://youtu.be/p5rAkdEVC9g?si=2va4O4VPvFYc3mi7

This is a growing map of MMIW/P resources available across Turtle Island to help groups and families quickly locate agencies, non-profits, grassroots, and other organizations that provide direct services to families of MMIW/P and survivors of violence. The map was co-developed by Waking Women Healing Institute, the Data + Feminism Lab, and MIT students. We hope to improve responses and increase access to support for those experiencing violence and cases of MMIW/P.  Each dot opens a pop-up that shares the location, contact details, and services available for each known entity. Notably, this is an on-going, collaborative effort to map Indigenous-led, community-based organizations and we welcome your suggestions for groups that should be on the map. Please reach out to us with your suggestions at sthompson@wakingwomenhealingint.org and dignazio@mit.edu.

Waewaenen to Profs. Elizabeth Rule, Gabriella Carolini and Larry Susskind for leading the Indigenous Environmental Planning course from which our collaboration began.

MAP👇

To view the map you can scan the QR code above or click this link: https://shorturl.at/hOGgt

We have expanded the mapped resources to include so called Canada, United States, and Mexico.  The image to the left is a highlighted view of what users will experience when navigating the map.  They can search and filter resources by 3 main categories: Direct Services, Coalition, and Both Coalition & Services.

NEWS and UPDATES from Trace

Ellowyn's Lakota doll

REBLOG from 2011 AND EDITED:

 

I thank everyone for reading this BLOG and for signing up to get it via email (top box).
 

Back in 2011:
On average I hear from three new adoptees each week. That is good. That was and is my prayer. That is why I am a journalist who blogs about adoption news and being adopted. I will help anyone who contacts me and I will get them the help they need if I cannot do it myself.
I have been working all year on a brand new second edition of ONE SMALL SACRIFICE and it should be out in a few weeks. It's the same book with a few more chapters. It has two prefaces, four major chapters and an epilogue.  Also, there is a new WARNING to readers that this is NOT a chronology but written as I was learning and remembering my own childhood and doing the search for my family.  My book has Indian history born of pain and experience, history you won't read in newspapers or mentioned in North American classrooms.
 

One of the best comments I hear is I did a lot of research. Yes, indeed. Over five years and counting and I am still learning.
Book 2: TWO WORLDS: Lost Children of the Indian Adoption Projects is ready and we are looking for a publisher.  This new anthology goes further and tells individual adoptee stories, in their own words. This book will change hearts and exposes more of our history! I will let you know when we do get it published.
The ultimate goal of this blog is to find new adoptees (Lost Children of the Indian Adoption Projects) and to have a group of adoptees testify before Congress to expose how we were adopted and erased from our tribal nations - deliberately.  Some of us were physically and sexually abused (YES) and in many states we are STILL denied access to adoption records so we cannot go home to our tribes and families.

 

A few days ago I made a new relative in South Dakota, Evelyn Red Lodge, also an adoptee and a journalist at Native Sun News. Evelyn is working to make these hearings happen, in the not-too-distant future. She helped NPR do their three-part investigation (posted on this blog in November) which made headlines across the globe. 
Adoptees like Evelyn and Sandy White Hawk at First Nations Orphans Association are rewriting history and helping others to heal with their activism. Here is a link to Evelyn's story on Indianz.com: http://64.38.12.138/News/2011/003731.asp
Evelyn is helping to organize a rally for residents in South Dakota to stop the adoptions of Indian children in her state. More happen each day, in violation of the Indian Child Welfare Act. 32 states are in violation of the Indian Child Welfare Act, according to recent NPR reports.
As I wrote on this blog, our governments in North American made us orphans and sealed our records so we'd disappear completely. But they can't erase our blood or our memory.
If erasure was the intention of the Indian Adoption Projects - to separate families and ensure adoptees would lose contact with their tribal relatives - in many ways they succeeded.
Now, today, our major task is to expose this attempted ethnic cleansing and rejoin our families and our nations.
Until all adoption records are open, in particular the Indian Adoption Projects and Indian Programs, conducted secretly in many states, I will not rest.
And neither should you...

The Challenge of Indian Child Welfare Act Enforcement in the Modern Age of Child Dependency

 

Kathryn E. Fort has published “The Challenge of Indian Child Welfare Act Enforcement in the Modern Age of Child Dependency” in the Yale Law Journal Forum.

Here is the abstract:

Nearly fifty years after its passage, the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) remains a vital part of the child welfare system to protect Native children and families. Since then, both federal and state law have incorporated provisions of ICWA for the benefit of all families in that system. However, ICWA itself is regularly disregarded and misunderstood by practitioners and judicial officers. This Essay describes the application of ICWA in the current child welfare system, as well as identifies programs designed to improve implementation of the law, all from the perspective of an appellate practitioner with twenty years of ICWA experience.  While there is no magic wand to wave that can fix the persistent barriers to ICWA enforcement and implementation, the continued work of those committed to changing the current system creates solutions that can benefit Native families and, if history is any guide, ultimately all families.

right click to enlarge

LINK: https://turtletalk.blog/2026/04/09/kate-fort-on-icwa-enforcement/#like-113815 

 

PDF: https://yalelawjournal.org/pdf/01KN2PHFX065GCH031FH4KAC1J.pdf 

Why isn't there a US Truth and Reconcilation Commission?

REBLOG from 2015

By Trace Hentz, blog editor

I've been asked why America has not issued an apology for their Indian Adoption Projects or ARENA adoptions when Canada is now openly admitting what it did, calling it cultural genocide, lawsuits have been filed and adoption records opened and repatriation services have been created for 60s Scoop adoptees... in CANADA, but not here!

Why is America in denial? Why don't we have a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) for the thousands of Native adoptees here who suffered the same fate as Canada's 60s Scoop adoptees? 

First: Most Americans (including politicians) don't even know it happened here! Call it bad history...

Second: It will take many adoptees to come together - for many years we didn't know what happened either or how we were part of a devious racist corrupt government program!

Why don't we have a class action lawsuit? We could!

Years ago, I did contact NARF (sending them books) and the ACLU and inquired but no one was interested. One adoptee isn't enough to warrant suing the federal government! I wanted this to happen eventually so I worked on three four books, hoping this would pave the way for a future lawsuit, finding many adoptees who were part of these programs, having them write and document their own stories. They could be part of the lawsuit.

 To my knowledge, Maine is the only state with a TRC. It's a first step. 

This book is also our history and the basis for a strong lawsuit:

A Generation Removed: The Fostering and Adoption of Indigenous Children in the Postwar World Margaret D. Jacobs hardcover 2014. 400 pp. 978-0-8032-5536-4

Foundation aims to serve all Survivors of the Sixties Scoop

 

Webpage

The National Sixties Scoop Healing Foundation of Canada

https://www.sixtiesscoophealingfoundation.ca/

Welcome to the National Sixties Scoop Healing Foundation of Canada – a new, independent organization, established through the National Sixties Scoop Settlement. Our mission is to accompany Survivors and their descendants along their healing journey by supporting cultural reclamation and reunification, holistic wellness services, advocacy, commemoration, and educational initiatives.

‍

Our Survivor-led, volunteer board of directors was appointed in November 2020, with the mandate to make the Foundation a reality. We envision a future where Sixties Scoop Survivors are welcomed and become a community filled with healing and wellness. We envision a world that has deeper knowledge and empathy for Survivors’ experiences and histories.

‍

Independent of government, the Foundation aims to serve all Survivors of the Sixties Scoop—Inuit, First Nations, Métis, status and non-status—in every region of Canada and beyond. We are in our early days and have much work to do in the months ahead to begin achieving the Foundation’s potential.

‍

We invite you to join us and share your feedback as we grow: https://www.sixtiesscoophealingfoundation.ca/contact

The National Sixties Scoop Healing Foundation of Canada's 2026 Grant Program

How to Read the Stars

 

What is a Western?

 Who does the western movie serve?

Read:

Liza Black’s Picturing Indians: Native Americans in Film, 1941–1960 (University of Nebraska Press, 2020)

Watch:

Escape from Fort Bravo (1953), featuring Diné (Navajo) extras and filmed in Arizona.

The Far Horizons (1955), featuring Shoshone extras and filmed in Wyoming.

Drum Beat (1954), featuring Apache extras and filmed in Arizona.

Warpath (1951), featuring Apsáalooke (Crow) extras and filmed in Montana.

The Return of Navajo Boy (2000) is an internationally acclaimed documentary that reunited a Navajo family and triggered a federal investigation into uranium contamination.  ADOPTION

Basketball or Nothing (2019) is a Netflix original series that follows the Chinle High basketball team in Arizona's Navajo Nation on a quest to win a state championship and bring pride to their isolated community.

Drunktown’s Finest (2014) features three young Navajos—an adopted Christian girl, a rebellious father-to-be, and a promiscuous trans woman—strive amid the hardships of life in Gallup, New Mexico, and the Navajo Nation.

Reel Injun: On the Trail of the Hollywood Indian (2009) traces the evolution of cinema's depiction of Native people from the silent film era to today, with clips from hundreds of classic and recent Hollywood movies, and candid interviews with celebrated Native and non-Native film celebrities, activists, film critics, and historians.

 

LINK:

https://theautry.org/explore/blog/picturing-indians-native-americans-film-1941-1960 

 

The problem is much bigger than we can actually show you in a report

Minnesota schools are not meeting requirements for American Indian language and culture classes

President and Executive Director of Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network Gimiwan Dustin Burnette presented at Fond du Lac Ojibwe and Dakota Language Symposium, 2025.

Photo courtesy of the Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network  

Schools that are required to provide American Indian language and culture classes are falling short, according to a recent statewide report.

The law requires districts where at least 5 percent of students are American Indian — or where 100 or more Native students are enrolled — to offer language and culture classes.

The Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network’s American Indian Language Instruction Report found districts across the state would need to hire more than 150 American Indian language teachers just to reach compliance — and that still wouldn’t meet the needs of Native students enrolled in public schools statewide.

"We find there is a 1:257 teacher-to-student ratio among the school districts in Minnesota that are required to provide language and culture classes,” the report said.

Research consistently links Native language instruction to stronger cultural identity, better academic outcomes, and a deeper sense of belonging — outcomes that matter especially for the approximately 31,000 American Indian students enrolled in Minnesota’s public schools, who have historically faced the highest dropout rates in the state.

“Our students make up about 3.5 percent of the Minnesota state student population, and our American Indian language educators are numbered at 98 out of 200,000 licensed educators in the state,” said Gimiwan Dustin Burnette, President and Executive Director of Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network. “They see Ojibwe and Dakota languages being valued as part-time considerations. That, to me, is the real cost and we don’t talk about it enough.”

A comprehensive picture

The nonprofit surveyed 197 public school districts — those serving 20 or more American Indian students — and all four Bureau of Indian Education schools in Minnesota during spring of 2025. Of those, 194 districts completed the survey, a response rate of 99 percent.

Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network used contact information provided by district administrators to reach out to 87 American Indian language teachers directly. Fifty-five of those teachers completed the survey, with a response rate of more than 60 percent.

Hannah Orie taught a course for the Ojibwe immersion teaching program at Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe University, October 2025.

Photo courtesy of Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network

The data reflects some growth in the number of language programs offered by school districts, according to Burnette. When Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network conducted its first survey in the 2022-23 school year, only 35 districts reported offering American Indian language instruction. That number has since grown to 51 — a roughly 40 percent increase in two years.

Burnette credits a 2024 update to state law that strengthened the legal requirement for districts to offer language classes as a significant factor.

“The new legislation was a big contributor to that increase,” said Burnette. “But it’s been a well-known fact in Indian country for decades that we need more.”

Of the 98 American Indian language teachers working in Minnesota public schools, only 11 are teaching full-time. Half of those surveyed spend 20 hours a week or less on language instruction — juggling other job duties on top of their language classes. Many teachers travel between multiple school buildings, teaching students across multiple grades, according to the report.

“Ideally, we’d have multiple full-time American Indian language instructors at each school where student population demands the need,” Burnette said.

The report goes on to say that teachers who do perform the work largely do so without adequate support. Seventy-eight percent reported being responsible for developing all or most of their own curriculum. Just one teacher in the entire survey said their district provided sufficient materials. No comprehensive Ojibwe language curriculum exists at any grade level — early childhood through high school, according to the data.

‘The solution will take time’

Nearly two-thirds of school administrators said teacher recruitment is a challenge, and more than half pointed to funding, according to the report. The two problems feed into each other — without enough money, districts can’t offer positions worth taking, and without good positions, qualified teachers look for jobs elsewhere.

Michael Migizi Sullivan teaching a course for the Ojibwe immersion teaching program at Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe University, October 2025.

Photo courtesy of the Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network

The report recommends an increase to the state’s American Indian Education Aid formula grant and investment in training programs for language teachers. The report also seeks the state’s help in establishing standards and curriculum that exists for every other subject taught in Minnesota schools.

Burnette hopes state lawmakers and school administrators will dig into the data and look for ways they can invest.

“The problem is much bigger than we can actually show you in a report,” Burnette said. “The solution will take time, investment and work. You can’t throw five million dollars at this problem and be done with it. This is going to take time, consideration, collaboration and hard work and it’s going to be worth it.”

• New video game engages Ojibwe language learners beyond the classroom

MPR: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2026/03/24/minnesota-schools-fall-short-on-american-indian-language-culture-classes 

Facing Impossible Odds

 OP-ED

Every step towards the future counts

Xavier Kataquapit

Published Mar 25, 2026  

Xavier Kataquapit /apsmc

I’m happy to see the ongoing support and assistance in our northern remote communities to help our people cope with so many lifelong and generational issues, trauma, and pain that our people carry. It took me many years to understand that these programs or services are not a one-stop service or a single program that will provide instant resolutions or cures for the issues that plague our people. Much of the trauma that our people deal with are issues that affect our communities across generations. 
These are issues that stem from generations of systemic racism in our northern communities, where being Indigenous was considered something negative to be looked down upon. That culture of looking down on a people is what led to the Residential School system, where Indigenous children were removed from their families and taught that they were not good enough as people. That cultural racism is also what led to the 60s Scoop, where Indigenous children were swept into the foster care system. There are also many more issues and difficulties that Indigenous people face everywhere across Canada that contribute to our families having to deal with way more trauma, tragedy and sadness. All those past harms may have stopped but when people suffer those difficulties as children, it is a pain they carry with them for a lifetime. 
So if these issues are born of years, decades, or generations, it stands to reason that it will also take a great deal of time, or even lifetimes, to deal with them in a positive and healing way. 
Over the past few years, it felt good to know that in my home community of Attawapiskat, the Crisis Mental Health Support program has provided much needed help in so many ways. This program by the Attawapiskat First Nation provides male and female traditional and mental health counselors in the community to those in crisis, those who are grieving or those who need trauma support. They provide group assistance and one-on-one counseling and they are available at all hours. 
The Crisis Mental Support program workers are trained individuals with experience in providing mental health support and counseling. Many of these workers are community members who can speak to those they assist in our Inineemoon (Cree language). Community members have reported that it’s comforting and reassuring to have these workers available and to be able to speak in our traditional language. These workers are available 24 hours a day, every day, with individuals rotating through regular shifts throughout the day or night. 
The community also supports a Peacekeeping program that aims to prevent or reduce the amount of alcohol and illegal substances entering the community.  In a recent public post by Joe Louttit, a community leader and organizer of the Peacekeeping program, an estimated $3.5 million street value of drugs and alcohol was prevented from entering the community this past year. Joe admitted that it did not fully stop the entry of all harmful substances from the community, but at the very least, it reduced the harm that could have been caused. 

The troubles that our northern remote communities are feeling today are reminiscent of the issues we faced with alcohol in the 1970s and 1980s. At the time, alcohol abuse felt like it was choking the life out of people. Airports were just introduced during this time, and regular flights brought in a steady supply of materials, including alcohol. Back then, as a child, I can remember feeling constantly in fear of what would happen as there was a near constant barrage of tragic events involving alcohol abuse that led to injuries, destruction and even death. 

Our community Elders and leaders rallied at the time and instituted a ban on alcohol and illegal substances because they saw what alcohol and drug abuse were doing to our people. It never completely stopped these activities, but it reduced this harm. I can also remember the feeling of safety and security that came back to the community once we knew that our Elders and community leaders were working hard to protect our people. 
In many ways, this modern opioid crisis feels the same as the alcohol abuse crisis in my home community in the 1980s. There are many different new street drugs that are making it far too easy to fall into the deadly trap of addiction.  
This is why I feel hopeful about the work that the Crisis Mental Health Support program and the Peacekeeping program have provided. In the face of overwhelming odds, the community is fighting back against a wave of alcohol and modern drug abuse. They are working to find solutions to help people cope with historical trauma. These programs may seem like small things that can’t do enough to help. It is the same hopeless feeling we felt in the community when we dealt with alcohol abuse in the 1980s. However, over time, these small steps created a small window of opportunity for a new generation to grow up in a brighter, healthier, and supportive environment. 
It may feel like these programs are fighting against impossible odds, but every step we take to save anyone we can, in any small way, contributes to greater rewards in life in the future. 

LINK: https://www.northernnews.ca/opinion/every-step-towards-the-future-counts 

 

We Knew This Was Coming

Roughly 200,000 children who were adopted overseas now at risk for deportation from US, lawyers say

International adoptees are terrified they will be caught up in Donald Trump’s ‘mass deportation campaign’ — and some may not even be aware they don’t have citizenship

Over the past 80 years, American parents have adopted a total of more than 500,000 children from abroad — some kidnapped from their biological parents by unscrupulous adoption agencies.

But some of those parents never got around to actually obtaining citizenship for their children, leaving tens of thousands who have spent almost their entire lives in the U.S. but have no legal status.

"Most immigrants know from the very beginning what they have to do to gain legal status, but many adoptees have never questioned whether or not they have it, until now," Minnesota-based family law attorney Mónica Dooner Lindgren told The New York Times in a recent report shedding light on the problem.

"The Department of State website says that a U.S. valid passport is sufficient to prove citizenship, but that is not preventing agents from detaining adoptees."

READ:  

https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/ice-deportation-international-adoptees-citizenship-b2944206.html

WHY ICWA MATTERS (debate for federal funds)

The House Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies has scheduled a hearing to discuss federal funding for adoption programs.

The witness list for the hearing on Thursday morning includes Aurene Martin, the Secretary for the National Indian Child Welfare Association. Martin, an attorney and citizen of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians, is a longtime advocate for tribal child welfare programs. “Across the country, tribal nations are redesigning their human services programs to better reflect their values, strengthen family engagement and improve outcomes,” Martin told the House Subcommittee on Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies last Tuesday. “And these efforts are working in child welfare.” “Many tribes and urban Native organizations are using Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) funds to support culturally based prevention services, services that strengthen families and reduce the need for foster care,” Martin said on March 17.

Martin’s testimony last week, along with the hearing this week, are part of the work that the House Committee on Appropriations is undertaking to prepare the fiscal year 2027 funding bills for federal agencies. The Interior subcommittee’s bill includes ICWA at the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which is part of the Department of the Interior.

Indian Mounds in North Carolina?

Of the state’s 65,000 archeological sites, only 53 are Indigenous mounds, while most are privately owned. NC Local takes a closer look.

When the Eastern Band of Cherokee last month received the deed to Noquisiyi Mound – a nearly 1,000-year-old mound in Macon County – they made history. The sacred space is one of only a few mounds officially returned to an Indigenous tribe in the country – and the first ever in North Carolina. The Eastern Band (EBCI) is the only tribe in the state that owns Indigenous mounds that were built by their ancestors, according to the state archeology office.

“There were many, many more, but they were eroded over time by natural causes or destroyed by humans,” Dylan Clark, deputy state archaeologist for North Carolina, said. Clark said the number of sites changes all the time as more sites are registered.

 READ: https://www.whqr.org/local/2026-03-23/there-are-dozens-of-indigenous-mounds-in-north-carolina-why-do-tribes-only-own-a-few

Virginia’s tribal leaders discuss sovereignty and education at ‘Native Voices’ event

Panelists discussed educational initiatives, the maintenance of tribal heritage and the legal sovereignty of each of their tribes

Native Voices event, photographed March 14, 2026. Photo by Isabela Delgado | The Cavalier Daily

By Charlotte Gabriel

 March 16, 2026    

Representatives from Virginia’s federally recognized Tribal Nations gathered for a University-sponsored discussion Saturday on politics, policy and culture. At the event, hosted in the Albert & Shirley Small Special Collections Auditorium, the panel of seven tribal leaders discussed the process of gaining federal recognition for tribal nations, the significance of tribal voices in history and in education and the maintenance of tribal heritage.  

The event was co-sponsored by the University’s Native and Indigenous Relations Committee, the Office of the Vice Provost for Academic Outreach, University Tribal Liaison Kody Grant and Assistant English Prof. Sarah Richardson’s ENWR 2520, “Special Topics in Writing — Virginia’s Native Community” class. It featured representatives from the seven federally recognized Tribes across Virginia — The Chickahominy, Eastern Chickahominy, Monacan, Nansemond, Pamunkey, Rappahannock and Upper Mattaponi.

A major topic that the panel discussed was the sovereignty of each nation as individual, separate entities. In the Commonwealth of Virginia, there are seven tribal nations recognized at the federal level and 11 tribal nations recognized at the state level. The relationship between tribal nations and the federal government is, under the U.S. Constitution, a relationship between two sovereign nations. 

The panelists highlighted the importance of sovereignty and the need for better recognition and support from state and federal governments. Kerry Canaday, a member of the Chickahominy Indian Tribe, discussed the legal relationships of tribal nations and the federal government — he noted the federal government dictates how the tribe can spend their money, which limits their sovereignty as a nation. 

“[Legally], we’re on the same playing field as Israel, England [and] France,” Canaday said. “When the United States gives them money, they are not told how to spend it, but … we’re told how to spend it, and then we [have to] report back to the government how we spent it — did we spend it the way that they said to? Did we use it all?” 

Chief Frank Adams of the Upper Mattaponi Tribe also spoke about this topic extensively, describing the restrictions on the tribe’s funding and the ability to function independently. Adams explained that while the state of Virginia makes money through taxes, the tribe must have their own laws and businesses to remain funded. 

The tribal representatives further cited a recent decision in Caroline County by the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality to permit the drawing of water from the Rappahannock River and dumping of the wastewater into the Mattaponi River. The Rappahannock Tribal Nation has contended that the DEQ did not involve them in its decision and deliberation regarding reducing the negative impacts on Rappahannock land. 

Gerri Wade, a citizen of the Rappahannock Tribe, said that the DEQ has neglected to work with the Rappahannock people or consult them on the maintenance of the environment of their tribal lands. She noted that the DEQ is attempting to build a data center which is going to deplete the river of clean water. 

“You can’t replace river water, you can’t keep it clean with what they’re doing,” Wade said. “[The data center] will affect the fish and the wildlife, the ecosystem and everything.”

Irma Adams, a citizen of the Nansemond Tribe, also mentioned the significance of the environment to tribal nations. She discussed how the Nansemond Tribe took custody of the ancestral land of their nation in October 2022, and that the land was a “mess” when they gained possession because it had previously been the site of a concrete factory.

Adams said that the land was stripped, full of invasive species and had heavily polluted land and water. However, the tribe has now started restoring land by working with the Virginia Department of Forestry to plant trees. 

Panelists also touched on the conservation of tribal heritage and culture through education and awareness. The Virginia Tribal Education Consortium is a group with the goal to “support the academic achievement and career and technical education success of tribal citizens.”

Canaday, a CTE project director and VTEC Office Liaison, emphasized the significance of Native American representation in educational curriculum. Canaday is currently working on developing new Standards of Learning coursework — the K-12 educational guidelines of Virginia — that is intended to include better representation of Indigenous history. 

“Teachers are hungry to know about the accurate Virginia Indian history, and not … just written from one side, as history is always written in the eyes of the winners,” Canaday said. “[Our tribes] are still here [and] we still have our stories. We know what we were taught, and know what our people went through.” 

VTEC also serves to support education for first-generation students, offering direct financial assistance as well as aid in other ways. However, according to Canaday, they have had difficulties in obtaining grants to fund the education of students who are tribal members. As a result, many tribal citizens are focused on trying to garner more support for VTEC and its programs.  

First-year College student Katherine Rose, who was in attendance for the event, said that hearing directly from the representatives of the tribal nations was impactful and exposed the shortfalls of the relationship between the Virginia government and tribal nations. 

“Virginia has a lot more work to do in regards to what the state does for its tribal nations,” Rose said. “I hope that U.Va. can become a bigger part of that.”

 

NOTE: Some of these tribes have fought a hundred years for recognition.  As they state in this story, THEY ARE STILL HERE.... The government stalls and stalls... Trace