Student Advocates for Native Communities American University

For those who are low on funds with ample time to spare, you too can participate in by giving your support to Land is Sacred: Stand With the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe movement:

1) Call Secretary of the Interior Bernhardt and/or Senator Hoeven, Chairman of the Committee on Indian Affairs, and let them know directly that you oppose the action to disestablish Mashpee Wampanog territory. (See link for contact info and scripts)

2) Join the nationwide virtual Sacred Fire Prayer Protest Light your candle/fire, let it burn 1-4 days, and post a picture with the hashtag to support of the Tribe and to denounce the Trump Administration for attempting to disestablish Mashpee Wampanog reservation!

nebula.wsimg.com

May 5th has been declared the National Day of Awareness for Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women. This proclamation includes Indigenous women, girls, two-spirit, trans, & non-binary people.⁣⁣
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Native & Indigenous Women & Girls are murdered at a rate 10x the National Average. 96% of rapes are perpetrated by non-Native men, but non-Native offenders are rarely prosecuted on tribal lands. ⁣⁣
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To honor victims, survivors, & their families, participants in the campaign have been asked to hang a red dress, shirt, or other article of red clothing in their window or outside of their homes.⁣⁣
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Thank you for this powerful & informative graphic. ⁣⁣
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Another history repeating:
Brazil’s Federal Public Ministry, as the office of the federal public prosecutor is called, warned on April 8 of the “risk of genocide” ...illegal miners, loggers, and land grabbers may be using the health crisis as cover to step up incursions into indigenous territories.

“Risk of genocide”: First coronavirus deaths reported in indigenous Amazon tribes — National Geographic “COVID-19 has fertile terrain to spread rapidly among the populations that live in Amazonia,” says president of prominent Brazilian rights group.

What you should know about Native Americans and Covid-19:

“We are operating in an environment of severe disadvantage,” Stacy Bohlen of the National Indian Health Board told indianz.com.

The coronavirus pandemic has served to further demonstrate the already deplorable social and health problems facing most tribes, including disproportionate rates of diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease, lung disease and immunosuppressive disorders – all conditions that health officials have said create greater vulnerability to COVID-19.

According to a survey conducted in early March of 197 tribal leaders, medical providers and partners, the NIHB found that 87 percent of respondents reported not having received any personal protective equipment from the federal government.

Another 82 percent of those who answered the survey said they were not using the COVID-19 test.

Native people experience overcrowded housing at a rate of eight times the national average, and nearly 32 percent of rural tribal households live more than 10 miles from the nearest grocery store—other challenges that exacerbate efforts to stop the spread of the coronavirus.

Many Native children won’t be able to continue learning while their schools are shut down, as 37% percent of Native students don’t have access to internet.

It’s important to remember that federal programs, like IHS and the Bureau of Indian Education, that serve tribal communities were paid for through the sacrifices of tribes. This is the obligation that the United States of America has to Indian Country through the treaties tribes signed when they ceded millions of acres.

In a March 7 letter to Alex Azar, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, the National Indian Health Board called on the federal government to distribute funding to tribes for COVID-19 through IHS, who would be better equipped to get those funds more quickly and directly to IHS and other healthcare facilities operated by tribes. That plea was rejected as the Trump administration announced that the CDC would be in charge of distributing $80 million, with no experience and a grave disconnect as to the needs of tribes.

It's not just the executive branch where troubling signs have emerged. S.3548, Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, announced last Thursday, has completely ignored and does not include Indian Country in the 247-page bill.

There are currently at least 40 COVID-19 cases in the IHS system, with Navajo Nation reporting 29 cases, plus untold numbers in urban communities and at facilities run directly by tribes.

Health care for American Indians and Alaska Natives is premised on numerous treaties and federal laws. But the IHS remains woefully underfunded -- it barely meets about half of the need in tribal and urban Indian communities, according to the U.S. government's own reports and data.

"Together these reports provide the very harsh reality that for decades, and even centuries, tribal nations have been severely and chronically underfunded in every public sector imaginable, whether it's health care, law enforcement, education or infrastructure," NCAI President Fawn Sharp said on Friday. Sharp leads the Quinault Nation in Washington state, one of the hardest hit regions in terms of COVID-19 cases and deaths.

Ecuador Amazon tribe win first victory against oil companies Ecuador's Waorani indigenous tribe won their first victory Friday against big oil companies in a ruling that blocks the companies' entry onto ancestral Amazonian lands for oil exploration activities.