cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/43316

This story was originally published by Northern Journal.

This story was produced as part of the Pulitzer Center’sStoryReach U.S. Fellowship. It’s the third in a series about access to commercial fisheries in rural Alaska; readPart OneandPart Two.

Nathaniel Herz
Northern Journal

METLAKATLA, ALASKA — Across Alaska’s coastline, from the Indigenous communities of Bristol Bay to the Tlingit and Haida villages of the panhandle, rural harbors that once bustled with commercial fishing boats now sit unused and empty.

Abandoned boats covered with mold and algae line the shores of one Southeast town; others have seen their fleets sold off and relocated.

In the Indigenous village of Metlakatla, though, it’s a different story.

Fishing vessels pack the downtown harbor on Annette Island, which sits just off the coast at Alaska’s southernmost tip. Huge seiners, with onboard cranes to reel in fish-laden nets, loom over the docks, with many more slips filled in by smaller gillnetters. Fathers and grandfathers still fish with sons and grandsons.

Experts and industry players disagree about the exact reasons for the decline of commercial fishing in the rest of rural, coastal Alaska — with some blaming state policies and others pointing to global market trends.

In Metlakatla, local leaders say their success in sustaining their fishing culture stems from the community’s unusual history.

In the 1970s, the village stayed out of a land claims settlement between Alaska Natives and the federal government — a deal that could have brought cash in exchange for ceding Metlakatla’s reservation and residents’ collective right to pull fish from the waters off their shores. All the other Native reservations in the state were terminated.

As a result, Metlakatla is the only Native community in Alaska that manages its own commercial fishing harvest. The right to earn a living from the ocean waters surrounding the island is tied to tribal membership and can’t be sold off to outsiders — as happened in other rural and Native communities across the state.

Elsewhere, Native residents of coastal villages and cities might have to pony up $100,000 or more for a permit to access state-managed commercial fisheries just offshore. Meanwhile, any Metlakatla tribal member with a boat and $25 can buy a permit and cast their net in the Indigenous-managed fishery that extends 3,000 feet around Annette Island.

“It’s 100 percent of the reason why we’re not down to one boat,” said Albert Smith, Metlakatla’s mayor.

The island fishery sustains the largest tribally managed salmon harvest in the United States. The 1,600-person community has dozens of active commercial fishing vessels, which harvested more than 1.3 million salmon in 2024, according to the most recent tribal data available.

The community stands today as a kind of experiment. Its fishery represents an alternate reality that could have unfolded in rural Alaska if more communities had the same opportunities to access nearby waters — or had state policymakers not chosen to privatize commercial harvest rights in the rest of Alaska’s big salmon fisheries, as they did in the 1970s.

Metlakatla’s narrative is a “direct refutation” of the argument that coastal Alaska Native villages are to blame for the loss of their fishing industries, said Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, who once represented Metlakatla in the state House and several years ago pushed an unsuccessful bill to boost access to rural commercial fishing careers.

In Metlakatla, “every slip in the harbor is full — high schoolers are deckhanding for their uncle, their dad, their best friend’s dad,” Kreiss-Tomkins said. “I think it’s a fascinating case study.”

Local leaders say they’ve still had to fight to sustain Metlakatla’s fleet and its tribal fishery.

The community is now in the midst of a six-year legal effort to expand the waters available to tribal members, which leaders say could help solidify the future of Metlakatla’s fishing industry. But its federal lawsuit faces opposition from Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s administration, competing fishermen and even neighboring Indigenous people.

‘We’re the salmon people’

The Metlakatlans left northern British Columbia in the late-19th century amid conflicts over land ownership.

Residents secured an invitation to America from President Grover Cleveland and members of Congress at the behest of William Duncan, a charismatic Anglican minister. Duncan had worked with the region’s Indigenous Tsimshian people to establish the original Metlakatla in British Columbia, which he envisioned as a model Christian community.

After a mass migration in canoes and other vessels, the new Metlakatla was built 70 miles away on Annette Island, just across the international border in Alaska, where residents eventually built an enormous church.

A cannery served as a market for residents’ ancestral fishing tradition, which the tribe has described as a “bedrock of the Coast Tsimshian culture and way of life.” A presidential proclamation from Woodrow Wilson in 1916 subsequently set aside the 3,000-foot strip around the island exclusively for use by the village’s fishermen.

For decades afterward, Metlakatla’s commercial fleet harvested both inside and outside the exclusive zone.

Skippers of today, who are mostly men, learned to fish from their fathers, who learned from their fathers and grandfathers before them.

Fishing is “one of the few things that remain unbroken from our forever history,” said David R. Boxley, a Metlakatla artist who served on the village’s tribal council until recently.

“That’s our culture, even though it’s changed in how we do it,” he said. “It’s as old as our people. We’re the salmon people.”

Tribal fishery ‘saved our butts’

In 1971, Congress passed the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, which came with a painful tradeoff.

Newly formed, Indigenous-owned corporations would receive a total of $1 billion and some 45 million acres — roughly 10 percent of the state. In exchange for that money and property, Alaska’s Indigenous people would give up claims to larger swaths of traditional lands, and those that had reservations would surrender them.

Most Alaska Native groups didn’t have reservations at the time, so they had little choice but to participate in the settlement.

Metlakatla had one of only 23 reservations in Alaska and exclusive fishing rights to boot, so it had more to lose. It may have also had less to gain, because the community’s emigration from Canada made its Alaska land claims less certain.

Some in Metlakatla wanted to pursue the payout anyway, according to Boxley.

But elders whose parents and grandparents had been through the exodus from the original village site in British Columbia saw their sovereignty as priceless, he explained.

“We’d already lost a Metlakatla,” Boxley said. “We had to build two communities — one was basically taken from us. Why would we do that again?”

The other 22 reservations in Alaska were dissolved as a result of the settlement. Today, only Metlakatla’s remains.

A few years after the other tribes settled, in an effort to prevent overfishing and make the industry more profitable, the state of Alaska established its “limited entry” program. The system capped the number of skippers in each commercial fishery and transformed fishing from a public right to a private privilege, one available only to those who could afford or inherit a permit. And since the supply of permits was limited, they became valuable commodities.

Commercial fishing permits can now be bought and sold on the open market, in some cases fetching six-figure prices. And over the years, residents of many rural and Indigenous communities have sold their permits to people from Alaska’s larger cities and towns, and from other states.

Rural fishermen also moved out of villages and took their permits with them. And those forces conspired to hollow out rural, coastal communities economically — even as Alaska lawmakers have done little to stem the tide.

In Metlakatla, though, tribal members don’t need those expensive permits to pursue a commercial fishing career. While many fishermen in the village have purchased them anyway — allowing harvests both inside and outside the 3,000-foot zone — other Metlakatlans fish only inside that exclusive strip.

Even top fishermen who roam well beyond Annette Island say that the tribal fishery has helped sustain them in lean years — particularly by providing lucrative catches of sea cucumbers and clams, which are harvested in underwater diving gear and fetch high prices in Asia.

“We’ve had terrible seasons seining,” said longtime Metlakatla fisherman Daniel Marsden, 48, referring to the technique of catching salmon with a huge, circular net. “And we go diving, and that saved our butts.”

A lawsuit to expand fishing rights

While commercial fishing remains vibrant in Metlakatla, the community’s fish processing plant is another story.

The business was long an economic mainstay for the village, providing local jobs and revenue for the tribal government.

But beginning in the 1990s, falling seafood prices challenged its profitability, and since 2018, it’s processed only small amounts of fish.

Today, the cavernous waterfront processing buildings, with peeling white paint, operate at a fraction of their capacity.

Most fishermen who live in Metlakatla and dock their boats in the village harbor sell the salmon they harvest not to the tribally owned plant, but to processing businesses in Ketchikan, 15 miles north. The tribal plant currently lacks the equipment it needs to handle the large volumes of salmon netted by Metlakatla’s fleet, Smith explained.

If more of Metlakatla’s up-and-coming fishermen could harvest farther from the island without having to buy expensive state permits, he added, their catch could be large enough to justify reinvesting in the tribally owned plant.

The 3,000-foot strip around Annette Island, local leaders argue, is no longer the community’s breadbasket. It’s become a “cage” holding back the village’s fleet, according to one longtime fisherman, Edward Gunyah.

To break out of that cage, Metlakatla filed a lawsuit.

Nearly six years ago, the tribe entered a complaint in federal court, asserting that the state of Alaska’s limited entry permit program was illegally barring Metlakatlans from harvesting in areas they were entitled to fish.

The tribe argues that an 1891 federal law granted it the right to enough fish to make the village self-sustaining — which should allow members to harvest anywhere within roughly a day’s travel from the reservation. The suit doesn’t seek to expel other skippers from the disputed waters, only to allow Metlakatla residents to fish there without buying pricey state permits.

“Congress intended to give the community an opportunity to prosper by accessing the fisheries in the waters surrounding the Annette Islands,” the tribe said in its amended complaint.

State and tribal opposition

Metlakatla’s attorneys filed the 2020 lawsuit in federal court on Aug. 7 — a yearly community holiday commemorating the 1887 arrival of the village’s advance party at Annette Island.

Since then, Metlakatla has won preliminary victories as the case has wound through rounds of lower court decisions and appeals.

But it has also faced strong opposition — from the state government, the fishing industry and other tribes.

“We’re going to see this through to the end,” Doug Vincent-Lang, Alaska’s fish and game commissioner, told a group of Ketchikan fishermen in 2024, according to a recording obtained by Northern Journal and APM Reports.

A win by Metlakatla, he said, would invite efforts from other tribes “that don’t have a treaty, or want to expand what they consider their rights to fish outside the state regulatory environment.”

“We’re not against Metlakatla,” Vincent-Lang said in an interview. “We support their right to fish in their tribal waters. It’s just when you start fishing outside of those waters, there’s treaty implications and everything else that comes into play. How do you account for that? It’s just all kinds of questions that come up.”

A trade group representing Southeast Alaska’s fleet of seine boats supports the state’s position.

Some of the group’s members are concerned about the potential for the lawsuit to expand Metlakatlans’ fishing rights in a way that increases competition, said Tom Meiners, who leads the group’s board.

“We don’t see the need for the island fishery to be expanded,” Meiners said, noting how numerous Metlakatla fishermen already have state permits and wouldn’t directly benefit if the tribe wins.

Meanwhile, nearly five years into the litigation, a group of other Southeast Alaska tribal governments, the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida, filed their own motion to dismiss Metlakatla’s case.

The request, ultimately rejected by the judge, said Metlakatla’s Tsimshian residents were descended from Canadians and were infringing on traditional Tlingit and Haida harvest rights and tribal property.

The fight against the lawsuit, particularly by the state and the other tribes, has deeply frustrated Metlakatla’s leaders and allies, who say the village has long contended with hostility to its unique fishing rights. They also say that both written and oral tradition reflect the longtime presence of Tsimshian people on both sides of the U.S.-Canadian border before it was established, with traditional names for Southeast Alaska sites derived from Tsimshian names.

“We should be working together” against factory fishing boats that accidentally harvest salmon, and against out-of-state commercial permit holders, said Boxley, the former Metlakatla tribal council member. He added: “That’s who’s devastating the fishery. Not us.”

‘Control our own future’

After five years of the lawsuit ping-ponging between lower and appeals courts, a decision on the expansion of Metlakatla’s tribal fishing rights could come as soon as this year.

Smith, the mayor, said a victory could help rev the village’s processing plant back to life.

“The vision is to see it going full-fledged again,” he said.

While awaiting a decision, the tribe leased a corner of the plant to a start-up, Circle Seafoods, that is testing a new concept for fish processing. Rather than trying to fillet and pack the whole summer salmon harvest in a single frenetic push of a few weeks, Circle freezes fish whole, then thaws and cuts them in batches throughout the rest of the year.

The tribe is interested in replicating the idea because it could sustain a year-round workforce in the village, Smith said. Meanwhile, Annette Island Packing Co., which is owned by the tribe, recently launched a line of freeze-dried salmon pet treats. They’re branded as Ksa Hoon — “just fish” in Sm’algyax, the Tsimshian language.

Operating at full capacity, the plant could churn out profits that the tribe could use to diversify — investing and expanding into other businesses such as ecotourism, Boxley said. He described the lawsuit as aligning with Metlakatlans’ decision a century ago to move from Canada to Alaska, where tribal members would have more autonomy.

“We did all this to be in control of our own future,” Boxley said. “That’s why we came here.”

This story was produced as part of the Pulitzer Center’sStoryReach U.S. Fellowship. It was reported and edited by Northern Journal and APM Reports.

The post ‘The salmon people’: How Alaska’s only Native reservation saved its fishing culture appeared first on ICT.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/41608

This story was originally published by South Dakota Searchlight.

Joshua Haiar
South Dakota Searchlight

Opponents filed a lawsuit in early April challenging the U.S. Forest Service’s approval of a graphite drilling project near Pe’ Sla, a site in the Black Hills of western South Dakota that holds cultural and spiritual significance for Native Americans.

The plaintiffs are the Indigenous rights group known as NDN Collective and the Black Hills Clean Water Alliance, both based in Rapid City, and Earthworks in Washington, D.C.

The lawsuit challenges the Forest Service’s decision allowing Rapid City-based Pete Lien & Sons to move forward with exploratory drilling for graphite. Graphite is used in electric vehicle batteries, lubricants, pencils and other products.

Pe’ Sla, also known as Reynolds Prairie, is a sacred site used for prayer, ceremony and cultural activities. The area is a high-elevation meadow surrounded by forested mountains in the central Black Hills. Pe’ Sla is one of the sites in the Black Hills that corresponds with celestial features in traditional Lakota spirituality.

The lawsuit says the Forest Service improperly used a process known as a “categorical exclusion” to bypass environmental and cultural reviews.

“We will not stand for the desecration of our sacred sites, land, and water by extractive mining companies like Pete Lien,” said Wizipan Garriott, president of NDN Collective, in a press release. “The laws of the United States are often rigged against us, but we are confident this categorical exclusion was unlawful.”

The lawsuit alleges a categorical exclusion was improper because the project includes drilling, road work and other activity near Pe’ Sla that goes beyond what a categorical exclusion allows. The plaintiffs also argue that Pe’ Sla’s religious and cultural importance should have triggered a fuller review rather than the abbreviated process.

Neither Pete Lien & Sons nor the Forest Service immediately responded to requests for comment.

A representative of Pete Lien & Sons previously toldSearchlight the company was reviewing the plan’s potential impact on sites of cultural and historical significance in the proposed project area, and questions and concerns should be directed to the Forest Service.

The post Opponents sue over Forest Service’s approval of drilling near Lakota sacred site in Black Hills appeared first on ICT.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/40641

BRASILIA (AP) — Indigenous people in Brazil have marched in the capital, Brasilia, to protest what they say are violations of their land rights. They accuse large corporations of advancing farming, logging and mining projects on their lands. The protest is part of the annual Free Land Indigenous Camp, Brazil’s largest Indigenous mobilization. This year’s gathering comes amid rising reports of violent attacks against the Pataxo people in Bahia state. Indigenous women have been protesting since February in Para state against a massive gold mine project. Despite some advances under President Lula, Indigenous rights remain under pressure from Congress and economic interests.   Indigenous protesters set fire to skull sculptures representing lawmakers to protest Congress. Image by Eraldo Peres, Associated Press. Pataxo Indigenous women hold up cardboard cutouts of jaguars as they get ready to attend a march with the slogan: “Congress, enemy of the people: our future is not for sale.”  Image by Eraldo Peres, Associated Press. Indigenous people marching. Image by Eraldo Peres, Associated Press. By Gabriela Sá Pessoa, Associated Press Banner image: Indigenous people march during the annual “Acampamento Terra Livre,” or Free Land Encampment, Brazil’s largest annual Indigenous mobilization that focuses on land rights and environmental protection, in Brasilia, Brazil, Tuesday, April 7, 2026. Image by Eraldo Peres, Associated Press.This article was originally published on Mongabay

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/40714

Stewart Huntington
ICT

David Fadden is not blind to hard truths.

“You can’t help but become angry about the injustices and land theft and all the wrong steps that occurred in this country towards Indigenous people,” he said.

But bitterness, Fadden said, is not an answer. A Mohawk Nation citizen and director of the Six Nations Iroquois Cultural Center in New York’s Adirondack State Park, Fadden thinks it’s best to look back to move forward.

“One way to correct that is to use our ancestor’s philosophy as an example,” he said.

With the help of the Nature Conservancy and others, Fadden’s cultural center and museum last month acquired a 600-acre tract of woodlands for $1.1 million from Paul Smith’s College. The land is adjacent to the center’s existing 330-acre campus in Onchiota, New York.

Initial plans call for ecological restoration as some of the property has been logged. Hiking paths and a youth camp are envisioned in the future, Fadden said. The land is part of the traditional homelands of Fadden’s Mohawk ancestors. It is also part of the broader territory of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, the historically sturdy alliance of six nations in what is today mainly New York and Ontario, Canada.

“We’re going to invite knowledgeable folks from [the Haudenosaunee Confederacy] to come to explore the property, to identify what’s under in terms of medicinal plants, food plants, animals, their habitats and their trails,” Fadden said. “And in coming years, we’ll develop a trail system that will avoid the more sensitive areas so we don’t walk on delicate plant life.”

And the land will be protected by carefully constructed legal guard rails. The cultural center is a non-profit entity that will own the land. The land title will come with conservation easements restricting what can be down on the property. Importantly, the text of the easements will be based on Haudenosaunee values of peace and reflect how Indigenous communities view land stewardship with a laser focus on how any decision will benefit future generations.

And, in what is believed to be a first in New York state, the easements will be filed in both English and Mohawk.

“We’re going to frame it very similar to the Two Row Wampum,” said Fadden, referring to the beaded belts of parallel colors that represented a commitment to harmony between Haudenosaunee Nations and early Dutch settlers centuries ago. The new documents will be “a binding agreement, a compact, a promise that will both take care of the land.”

Six Nations Iroquois Cultural Center Director David Fadden, Mohawk, sits in front of art work and displays at the center in Onchiota, New York. The center recently acquired 600 acres of woodlands. Credit: Screengrab/ICT

Despite the fact that the Dutch – and their French, British and American successors – did not respect the peaceful precepts of those original pacts, Fadden maintains a commitment to the ideals of his ancestors. Under the new conservation easements, “we will help each other and we’ll learn from each other. Hopefully this will set a good example for others in the future,” he said.

The folks at the Nature Conservancy agree. The global conservation organization has been growing partnerships around the world with Indigenous nations and communities and said it was excited to team up with the Iroquois Cultural Center on this project.

“Some of the members of the Haudenosaunee community had come to us and asked if we could help find a property in the Adirondacks where the they could gather as a community and create a home for a Native youth camp,” said Peg Olsen, director of the Nature Conservancy’s New York State Indigenous Partnerships program. “When we realized this property was up for sale, it had all the elements. It could provide an opportunity for ecological restoration. It had cabins that would be good for a youth camp. And it happened to be right next door to the Six Nations Iroquois Cultural Center.

“It’s like all the stars aligned,” she said.

“Since time immemorial, the Haudenosaunee have lived in reciprocal relationship with these lands and waters,” said Bill Ulfelder, executive director of The Nature Conservancy in New York. “This [land purchase] marks The Nature Conservancy in New York’s first land return and demonstrates our commitment to expanding Indigenous access, care, and ownership of land.”

A 600-acre tract of woodlands in New York Adirondack State Park has recently been returned to Haudenausonee stewardship with the help of the Nature Conservancy. “I always had a fear that it would be sold off to developers or loggers,” said Mohawk citizen David Fadden who explored the land extensively as a child. Credit: Becca Halter/Adirondack Land Trust

Which brought – and brings – a smile to Fadden’s face. He grew up in and around the property and explored it extensively.

His grandparents Ray and Christine Fadden founded the cultural center in 1954.

“As a young person, I used to hike that area,” he said. “I knew those woods like the back of my hand. And, I always had a fear that they would be sold off to developers or loggers.”

Today that fear is gone, replaced with hope.Now, the 600 acres Fadden wandered in his youth “will serve as a classroom to share and learn Indigenous ecological knowledge for Native and non-Native students alike for generations,” he said.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/40170

This story was originally published by Source New Mexico.

Danielle Prokop
Source New Mexico

Three New Mexico Pueblos, Santa Ana, Zuni and Cochiti, recently received federal funding for tribal conservation programs and wildfire management that will be used to support efforts surrounding endangered birds, bald eagles and Bighorn sheep.

The awards, close to $200,000 each for Santa Ana and Cochiti, and approximately $180,000 for Zuni, come as part of $6.6 million distributed through the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Tribal Wildlife Grants program, which funds more than 700 conservation programs operated by Native American and Alaska Native Tribes. The most recent grants, announced last week, will benefit 35 tribes.

“Tribes are vital partners in wildlife conservation, and we’re proud to support projects that reflect their connection to the land and leadership in protecting it,” U.S FWS Service Director Brian Nesvik said in a statement. “These investments support tribal sovereignty while advancing our shared conservation goals.”

Santa Ana Pueblo will use its funds to install wildlife recording devices along the Rio Grande to monitor two endangered birds: the Yellow-billed cuckoo and the Willow flycatcher.

Zuni Pueblo was granted the funds for Zuni Eagle Aviary, which houses debilitated gold and bald eagles. The funding will assess the facility’s wildfire risk, install safety systems and clear brush. Additionally, the funding will be used for expanding the aviary’s work to include “rehabilitation and release program” on site. Neither Santa Ana nor Zuni Pueblos responded to Source NM requests for comment.

Cochiti Pueblo will use its funds to track Bighorn sheep population, which the Pueblo and the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish reintroduced in 2014 to the Cochiti canyon and the Jemez mountains after a century-long absence of herds in that area.

Specifically, Cochiti Pueblo will monitor the Bighorn sheep for the parasitic New World screwworm moving through Mexico.

The Pueblo will also restore the habitat devastated by the 2022 Cerro Pelado wildfires, which, in combination with drought, threatens the herd’s ability to move and much of their food, according to Earl Conway, the director of the Natural Resources and Conservation program at Cochiti Pueblo.

“These stressors combined have made it difficult for bighorn sheep to move safely across the landscape, maintain herd health, and sustain stable population levels,” Conway said in a statement.

The funding will help with targeted habitat restoration, replanting of fire-resistant vegetation and tracing the herd’s movements.

“Combined with wildfire prevention measures, these activities will reduce the risk of future habitat loss and ensure a more resilient and sustainable environment for Bighorn sheep herds,” he said.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/40191

Before the war, our home garden was more than just a patch of green. It was a refuge I retreated to whenever the world felt too heavy. Bougainvillea climbed the walls, and flowers in every color filled the corners — tended by my mother as if they were her own children. In one corner stood a pomegranate tree we had brought from a nursery in Beit Lahia in northern Gaza — a city long known as the Strip’s food basket, with its fertile agricultural lands.

When the war began, our priorities shifted entirely. There was no longer space for beauty. Survival became the only goal. The flowers withered, and the once-vibrant garden turned into a silent gray space. We uprooted the blossoms and planted onions in their place, trying to ease the burden of hunger and soaring prices. Only the pomegranate tree remained — an enduring reminder of an agricultural city whose lands were bulldozed and whose residents were denied return.

Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun, which once supplied much of Gaza with fruits and vegetables, have been reduced to devastated terrain. By late 2025 and into early 2026, satellite analyses from the Food and Agriculture Organization and the UN Satellite Center show that up to 98 percent of fruit-bearing tree cropland — including olives and pomegranates — has been destroyed, while more than 87 percent of overall cropland and more than 80 percent of greenhouses have been damaged or wiped out. Only a tiny fraction of Gaza’s agricultural land — somewhere between 1.5 percent and 4 percent — remains both accessible and undamaged, mostly in limited southern areas, leaving the north largely off-limits due to restrictions, contamination, and military zones. This was not merely collateral damage. It was a direct assault on food security and livelihoods that continues to unfold even after the fragile ceasefire began in October 2025.

Source

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This article was originally published by KOSU, an independent news service based in Oklahoma.

Sarah Liese (Twilla)
KOSU

The Choctaw Nation announced last week the purchase of a former Big Lots distribution facility and adjoining land in Durant, which had been speculated to be a potential detention center site for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The Choctaw Nation Council passed a bill on March 14, approving the purchase of the facility. Last week, Chief Gary Batton confirmed the acquisition in a statement, calling it an opportunity to strengthen the tribe’s long-term business strategy.

When in business, the 1.2 million-square-foot Big Lots distribution facility employed more than 300 workers. It closed in January 2025 due to the company’s overall financial distress.

“We are evaluating how to use this adjoining property as part of our efforts to support operational growth and exploring a variety of potential uses that align with our strategic vision,” Batton said in a statement. “This is an opportunity to enhance our presence and continue driving economic prosperity for our tribal members and the surrounding community.”

The potential for the former Big Lots distribution center to open an ICE detention facility came under fire in January, when both the Choctaw Nation and Durant City Council took precautionary measures to ensure the facility aligned with their communities’ best interests.

The Durant City Council put guardrails in place and passed an ordinance in January that makes it illegal for a detention center to operate without a conditional use permit.

Choctaw Nation council members sounded the alarm that the facility is “unacceptably close to the nation’s governmental headquarters” and community-serving facilities, including childcare and elderly services. The council then unanimously passed an oppositional bill, which Batton later signed into law.

When talking about the tribe’s opposition to the facility in January, Batton said it would be like having a detention center close to the White House.

“We don’t want it close to our facility…due to the safety and concern for our young and for our old, but also for all of our employees, our customers that come here,” Batton said in an interview about the bill.

Batton said he became concerned because he had heard the Bryan County Sheriff’s Office was in talks with the officials from the Department of Homeland Security. He also suggested that he is not entirely opposed to having an ICE facility open inside the reservation, as long as it makes sense for the community.

“If you think about it, in McAlester, we have a prison here,” Batton said. “Every county has a jail. So it’s not that I would oppose having a facility that houses bad people, if you know what I’m saying. But I would want it to be in a place that’s a good, safe, controlled environment.”

The amount of money spent on the Choctaw Nation’s acquisition is unclear. The Bryan County Assessor’s Office said it had not received all the paperwork and could not confirm the cost.

It will, however, be the second action taken in Oklahoma to shut down the opening of a potential ICE facility. It follows an Oklahoma City warehouse that was no longer being considered as an ICE detention center, after Mayor David Holt met with the owner and confirmed they are no longer in talks with the Department of Homeland Security.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/39613

Miles Morrisseau
ICT

WINNIPEG, Manitoba — Driving west on Marion Street, the billboard stands out dramatically amidst the signs selling insurance and promoting local radio stations.

“First Nations children want the one-parent rule to happen now,” it says.

The billboard is one of 15 placed across the province of Manitoba, and Lou Moodie plans to put up more to spread the word across Canada.

Moodie, Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation, is a man on a mission. He wants the government to pass legislation known as Bill S-2, and he wants them to do it now.

The bill would remove a clause enacted in 1985 in the Indian Act that created two kinds of Status Indians.One group 6(1) could pass their status to their children no matter who they had children with, and the other group 6(2) could not pass their status if they had children with a person who did not have status.

It’s known as the “second-generation cut-off.”

“What they did was they inserted category 6(1) and 6(2),” Moodie told ICT recently. “What that policy basically states is that you cannot have any children with non-status people. If you do, the reprisals are that your child will be categorized or downsized or watered down to a 6(2).”

Children are also being categorized as a 6(2) if the father is not identified on the birth certificate.

“There’s one thing that is talked about, and that is having children with non-status people, but the forgotten one is that if the woman did not identify the father on the birth certificate, that child was watered down to a 6(2). So that’s a forgotten piece.”

Indigenous Services Canada counts 325,024 Status Indians as 6(2) of the total registered population of nearly 1.3 million as of November 2024, which is more than 25 percent of the population.

Bill S-2 was introduced in Canadian Senate by Sen. Paul Prosper, Mi’kmaw. The deletion of the clauses, if approved by Parliament, would allow the children of all Status Indians to be recognized in subsequent generations.

Canadian Sen. Paul Prosper, Mi’kmaw, introduced a bill in Parliament that would allow the children of all Status Indians to be recognized in subsequent generations. The bill received unanimous support from the Senate before moving to the House of Commons, where it had not been scheduled for a vote as of April 1, 2026. Credit: Courtesy photo

For now, however, thousands of First Nations people live in bureaucratic limbo where they don’t have the freedom to fall in love and have children with whomever they want for fear that their children and future generations will no longer be legally recognized as First Nations.

“I truly believe that there is no greater existential threat to First Nations than the second-generation cut-off,” Prosper told ICT in an email. “Ever since the cut-off was introduced in 1985, First Nations have been pushing back; there have been countless consultation sessions. Time and time again, advocates have called for an end to government involvement in determining who our people are.”

Removing people from the registry

The changes enacted in 1985 were part of a long-term plan by the Canadian government to reduce and perhaps eliminate Indian status in the First Nations population using various clauses in the Indian Act. In addition to controlling nearly every aspect of First Nation life from cradle to grave, the Indian Act of 1876 had mechanisms that would remove people from the registry of so-called Status Indians.

In an earlier version of the Indian Act, Indian status would be lost if the person was deemed “civilized” by attending university, becoming a doctor or lawyer, or being ordained as a minister or priest. This was in place until the 1920s.

In decades following, First Nations who joined the war efforts in World War I and World War II would also be subject to loss of status upon their return home to Canada. This was called “enfranchisement” and was at the discretion of the all-powerful Indian agents who ran the communities and its members as their personal fiefdom.

Up until 1985, First Nations women who married a non-Status man would lose her Indian status. It did not matter if the man was Métis or a First Nations man without status, such as a veteran of war who had been enfranchised, she and her children and future generations would all be classified as non-Status.

They would not be allowed to live on the reserve or receive any support provided by the government to First Nations people.

On the contrary, non-Indigenous women who married a status First Nations man would be granted full Indian status.

This was the law of the land for more than a century, until the implementation of Bill C-31 in 1985. Although the bill corrected the gender inequality to a certain degree, it did not eradicate the mechanism that would still rob current and future generations of First Nations people of their legally recognized Indian status. It contained the “second-generation cut-off.”

The Indigenous Services Canada website explains the second-generation cut off.

“After two consecutive generations of parenting with a person who is not entitled to registration (a non-Indian), the third generation is no longer entitled to registration. Entitlement is therefore cut off after the second-generation. In other words, an individual will not be entitled to Indian registration if they have one grandparent and one parent who are not entitled to registration.”

The Indigenous Services website also explains that the cut-off is “mechanical” and there are no means for debate or opportunity to contest; it is a bureaucratic algorithmic reality.

‘That’s just who I was’

For Jeannette Corbiere-Lavell, the fight to protect First Nations status and citizenship started more than 50 years ago. She married her husband, a non-Indigenous man, and a few weeks later she received a letter from the Canadian government telling her she no longer had Indian status and was no longer a member of her home community.

“1970, that’s when I met my husband, David Lavell, and we were in Toronto at the time,” Corbiere-Lavell told ICT. “Two weeks later, I received this letter from the Department of Indian Affairs and it said, ‘Jeannette Corbiere, enclosed please find a check for $35. And you are no longer a member of the Wikwemikong Unceded Territory.’”

Jeannette Corbiere-Lavell, shown here at right in this undated photo, has been fighting for equality for decades in Canada. In 2026, she’s now working for changes to Canadian law that would allow Indian Status to be handed down to future generations. Credit: Photo courtesy of Jeannette Corbiere-Lavell

Although she was aware that this was the law at the time, as she knew other First Nations women who had also lost their status, the reality of it hit her hard.

“I really had that sense of loss,” she said. “Now, what? I’m no longer part of my community. This is the only place I’ve ever known, you know, prior to coming to Toronto, because I went to school there and my relatives, family had the language, everything, aunts and uncles, and that’s just who I was. And so that started that whole big challenge.”

Corbiere-Lavell was acquainted with Clayton Ruby, one of Canada’s most well-known civil rights lawyers, and he agreed to take on her case if she wanted to challenge the law as discriminatory against First Nations women.

The case went all the way to the Canada Supreme Court, where they lost in a close decision. But the advocacy work continued, including forming organizations like the Ontario Native Women’s Association to speak on behalf of Indigenous women’s rights.

The Indian Act was amended in 1985 with Bill C-31, which allowed women who had lost their status through marriage or men such as veterans who had been “enfranchised” to regain their Indian status.

“I got my status back, but unfortunately again, and I don’t know if it’s because we’re women or whatever, but we didn’t get our full status,” Corbiere-Lavell said. “We were still being discriminated against. And this is what I’m leading up to when we’re talking about the current second-generation cutoff, because the Indian Act then in 1985, it still treated us, as women, secondary. We didn’t get our full rights back. It was designed so that our communities were losing more and more people. We were shrinking and we have statistics to show that.”

Corbiere-Lavell continues to fight the system that denies status to First Nations as the citizenship commissioner for the Anishinaabek Nation in Ontario.

‘Colonial legacies’

Bill S-2 must go through three readings in the House of Commons before it can be officially adopted into law.

The bill was introduced into the Senate on May 29, 2025. At the time, Canada’s Indigenous Services Minister Mandy Gull-Masty, Cree, said the bill was a priority for the government of the new Prime Minister Mark Carney.

“As Minister of Indigenous Services, eliminating gender-based inequities and colonial legacies in the Indian Act is a responsibility I take seriously,” said Gull-Masty. “This is one of the first bills proposed by this  government because we understand the urgency of these measures for those impacted. I look forward to thoughtful study and discussions about this bill as it moves through the parliamentary process.”

Debate continues in the Canadian House of Commons as the bill moves through the process of becoming law. During proceedings on Feb. 27, Gull-Masty noted that it was illegal for more than a century for a First Nations person with Indian status to be elected to Parliament.

The Canadian Parliament building in Ottawa, Ontario, is shown in this undated photo. Credit: Photo by Benoit Debaix on Unsplash

“I stand here to speak to Bill S-2, a vital step towards addressing inequities in the Indian Act,” Gull-Masty told the House. “It is worth remembering that before 1960, a First Nations woman like me would never have had the opportunity to sit in this chamber as a Member of Parliament unless she first gave up her status. To serve in Canada’s democracy, she would have been required to renounce legal recognition of who she was. That was the price of enfranchisement: participation in exchange for erasure.”

Prosper, who filed the bill, clarified that the bill is not going to assist anyone looking for a connection into a long-forgotten past to claim Indian status.

“S-2 does not seek to restore status to those who had a single First Nation ancestor sometime in their distant past,” he said. “It simply seeks to correct the injustice that was unilaterally imposed on First Nations in 1985. I believe that this bill is all about bringing families {together] that were arbitrarily divided [with] siblings into 6(1) and 6(2) groups based on their date of birth; it’s about recognizing the children that live in our communities, go to our schools, grow up in our traditions but have, sadly, been cut-off.”

Prosper references the treaty signed by his ancestors as proof that his people wanted to protect future generations.

“When Mi’kmaq signed the Peace and Friendship treaties, they specified that these treaty protections applied to their ‘heirs and the heirs of their heirs forever,’ indicating that it would apply to future generations in perpetuity,” he said. “There was never a qualification that these protections would be void due to intermarriage.”

The bill received unanimous support from the Canadian Senate before being sent to the House of Commons for final debate. The bill now has to go through two more readings in the House before a final vote will be made for the amendment to be approved, though no schedule hasa yet been set.

‘Guiding light’

Pressure continues across the country to get the bill pushed through the House of Commons, with First Nations organizations such as the Southern Chiefs Organization hosting online petitions and webinars to educate their citizens about the importance of the legislation.

In Manitoba, Moodie plans to expand his billboard campaign across the country to get the message out.

“I’m really pushing, that’s why you see all those billboards.” he said. “I’m going to Regina, I’m going to Vancouver, I’m going to Calgary, I’m going to Toronto, all along the lifeline of Canada, which is the Trans-Canada Highway. I’m trying to erect as many billboards as possible for the parliamentarians to see and hopefully recognize that this is real.”

In Ontario, elder Corbiere-Lavell continues the fight that started over a half-century ago, inspired by her traditions and spirituality.

“I was given the name North Star,” she said. “I was barely 20, I think, when I was in Toronto. I didn’t realize the significance at the time. My youngest son pointed that out. He said, ‘Mom, did you realize how everyone in the world looks at the North Star? That’s the guiding light.’”

She is willing to retain that responsibility.

“I believe that’s what I have to do … to make sure we don’t lose any of our people, and that we maintain that connection to our land, to those resources, to the water especially, to protect the water,” she said. “And that’s our role as women, and the men have their roles as well, for protection of our people. …We just have to remember it.”

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Amelia Schafer

ICT

RAPID CITY, S.D. – Sahela “Toka Win” Sangrait would have turned 22 on March 26. Instead,  more than 50 people gathered on her birthday to demand justice and systemic change.

Federal prosecutors have charged United States Airman Quinterius Chappelle with first-degree murder in connection to Sangrait’s homicide, which law enforcement say took place on the Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota on Aug. 10, 2024.

But those gathered say the crime could have been prevented.

Chappelle was convicted of aggravated assault following a February 2024 domestic incident not involving Sangrait, according to Jesse removederland, a sergeant with the Pennington County Sheriff’s Office. removederland testified during Chappelle’s November 2024 arraignment in the Sangrait case. The February 2024 incident was handled by Air Force authorities.

Additionally, local Box Elder law enforcement officials responded to a report of domestic violence at Chappelle’s residence on the night of Sangrait’s death but did not contact anyone inside the residence, removederland testified. Because the 2024 assault case was handled internally by the Air Force, it’s unclear if Box Elder police were aware of Chappelle’s criminal history.

Lorna Cuny, executive director of Indigenous motorcyclist advocacy group the Medicine Wheel Ride, holds a bundle of prairie sage and a lit candle at a vigil for Sahela Sangrait on March 26 in Rapid City, South Dakota.

“This should not have happened to her, there were signs, there were things that could have prevented her from facing this tragedy,” said Lorna Cuny, Oglala Lakota and the Executive Director of the Medicine Wheel Ride, a group of motorcyclists who raise awareness for the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women epidemic.

Sangrait’s grandmother agreed.

“I don’t have a hard heart,” said Vonda High Hawk, Mnicoujou Lakota. “But this girl should have lived. I think they (the Airforce Base) should at some point be held accountable for the wrongful death (of Sangrait). There’s a chain of command…These senseless crimes need to be handled appropriately by their chain of command. There has to be some type of example made of that.”

Chappelle and Sangrait were in a romantic relationship, family members said.

“She was killed by someone she knew… someone she trusted,” Hillary Dubray, Sangrait’s mother said. **“**We want her story to get out. She was just (about to turn) 21, just getting her life started, but her life was cut short.”

Dubray, Mnicoujou Lakota, stood firmly, wearing a bright red hooded sweatshirt with her daughter’s face on it. Dubrary gathered with family members, friends and community in chilly below-zero temperatures and drizzling rain on March 26 to demand justice for her daughter.

Two young men sing at a vigil for Sahela Sangrait on what would have been her 22nd birthday. Federal prosecutors have charged a United States Airman with first-degree murder in connection to Sangrait’s death. Credit: Amelia Schafer, ICT

“We want people to know she mattered,” said Sangrait’s other grandmother, Phyllis Bald Eagle, who is Mnicoujou Lakota and Mdewakanton Dakota.

Community members are organizing a mid-April demonstration outside of the Ellsworth Air Force Basewhere Sangrait was killed. Organizers from local MMIW advocacy groups, the Medicine Wheel Ride and the Red Ribbon Skirt Society, said the demonstration will bring awareness to Sangrait’s murder as they await the accused’s trial in Rapid City in May.

“It’s for justice,” said Frances Dupris, Sicangu Lakota/Northern Arapaho and an organizer with the Red Ribbon Skirt Society. Dupris spent 24 years as a United States Airman before retiring. “The individuals that should be held accountable for Sahela’s murder are Airmen… I was an Airman, I retired, so this is not to say that all Airmen are bad. But the people who do bad things need to be held accountable.”

Nationwide, Indigenous women are reported missing at a disproportionately high rate. Further, homicide is one of the leading causes of death among American Indians and Alaska Natives, a significant proportion of which are the result of domestic violence.

Sixty-one American Indian/Alaska Native people were reported missing in South Dakota as of March 26, compared to 95 total missing individuals, meaning roughly 65 percent of all missing people in the state are American Indian/Alaska Native. Natives make up only 11 percent of the statewide population. This percentage of missing Native people statewide has remained steady for over two years.

Vonda HighHawk speaks at a vigil for her late granddaughter Sahela Toka Win Sangrait, who federal prosecutors say was killed by a United States Airman on the Ellsworth Air Force Base. Credit: Amelia Schafer, ICT

So far, two individuals are federally charged in connection with Sangrait’s murder. Chappelle and Drew Durand, both 25 and both residents of Box Elder where the Ellsworth Airforce Base is located. Chappelle is charged with first-degree murder and Durand with accessory after the fact and misprision of a felony.

Law enforcement believe that Chappelle and Durand transported Sangrait’s body to the Black Hills National Forest in the early hours of Aug. 11. Sangrait’s remains were found by a hiker in a remote area within National Park boundaries near Hill City on March 11, 2025.

Police charged Chapelle days later with Sangrait’s murder.

Due to the homicide having allegedly taken place on the air force base and the body being found on National Park Service land, Chappelle and Durand are charged in federal court.

Chappelle and Durand will both appear before a 12-person jury May 25 at Andrew W. Bogue Federal Building in Rapid City. Each has pleaded not guilty.

Authorities believe Chapelle killed Sangrait at his residence on the Ellsworth Air Force Baseon Aug. 10. That same night, local law enforcement responded to a report of a domestic dispute at his residence but left without making contact with Chappelle or anyone inside the residence, according police testimony at Chapelle’s to a March 28, 2025, arraignment.

A man hold a sign depiciting Lakota woman Sahela Sangrait. Federal prosecutors have charged a United States Airman with first-degree murder in connection to Sangrait’s homicide and say her death occured on the Ellsworth Air Force Base in Box Elder, South Dakota. Credit: Amelia Schafer, ICT

Due to Chappelle’s assault conviction on the air force base, his commanding officer required him to go to local law enforcement when he arrived at work on Aug. 12 with finger nail scratches across his face. Chappelle reported to Rapid City law enforcement officers that the scratches were the result of an Aug. 10 break-in at his residence. Chappelle declined to follow up with officers regarding an investigation.

Crimes committed on an Air Force base are often prosecuted internally by the base’s court, meaning records of the incident are not available to the public or civilians. Due to this, no court records regarding Chappelle’s assault conviction are available to the public. Information regarding the incident was only made available to the public through law enforcement testimony at Chappelle’s arraignment.

In February 2024, Chappelle was charged with aggravated assault via strangulation.

He was found guilty for these charges in November, two months after the alleged

murder, removederland said. Chappelle also broke no-contact orders two separate times, according to removederland.

Sahela’s story

Sangrait comes from a strong lineage of Lakota and Dakota warriors – a legacy that lived on through her, her family said.

Her great-great-grandfather was Mdewakanton Dakota Chief Little Crow, also known as Ta-Oyate-Duta, who led the six-week 1862 Dakota Uprising in Minnesota. Little Crow is remembered as one of the Dakota 38+2, a group of Dakota men killed by the United States Government in retaliation for the uprising.

Sangrait was also a descendant of Chief Dave Bald Eagle, a World War II veteran who parachuted into the D-Day invasion of Normandy.  Bald Eagle was awarded a Silver Star and a Purple Heart for his service. Bald Eagle was also the grandson of Hunkpapa Lakota Chief White Bull, who was Sitting Bull’s nephew. White Bull fought in the Battle of Little Big Horn.

“There’s a beautiful history this lady comes from,” High Hawk said. “She comes from a very strong lineage, and she will never be forgotten.”

Sahela was given her Lakota name, Toka Win, which roughly translates to Different Cheyenne Woman, by her great-grandmother Clarenda Little Crow, who was Chief Little Crow’s Daughter.

“Everyone needs to know who she was and who she came from,” Bald Eagle said.

High Hawk said it’s paramount to remember Sangrait’s ancestor’s battles and what they went through while fighting for justice for her.

Community members gathered in honor of Sahela Sangrait on March 26 in Rapid City, South Dakota. Federal prosecutors have charged a United States Airman with first-degree murder in connection to Sangrait’s death. Credit: Amelia Schafer, ICT

“These injustices and these atrocities go way back,” High Hawk said. “There needs to be more awareness, more events like what we just did. … We will continue to say her name.”

Sahela grew up in the Black Hills area and moved to Rapid City at 18 years old, her mother said. In Rapid City she worked to fundraise for youth programming and was a vocal advocate for Indigenous youth.

“She was beautiful, just so pretty,” said Sangrait’s other grandmother Vonda High Hawk, who traveled over two hours from the Cheyenne River Reservation in South Dakota, to attend the vigil. “Regardless of the odds that were against her in this life she still radiated with beauty.”

Community members gathered in honor of Sahela Sangrait on March 26 in Rapid City, South Dakota. Federal prosecutors have charged a United States Airman with first-degree murder in connection to Sangrait’s death. Credit: Amelia Schafer, ICT

At just 20 years old, Sangrait hadn’t quite figured out what she was going to do yet as an adult, her family said. She was passionate about helping others and volunteered at Ateeyapi, a local non-profit youth program for Indigenous students in the Black Hills area. She also wanted to raise awareness for domestic violence victims, her mother said.

Sangrait will be buried in April on the Cheyenne River Reservation, her family said.

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My name is Jack Strong, and I’m a member of the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians. I’m the executive chef of The Allison Inn and Spa in Newberg, Oregon, and I’m a partner with the Siletz Valley culinary program at the school that I went to as a kid.

Students in the course cook from-scratch meals for the entire school (K through 12), located just outside the Siletz Reservation, in central Oregon. They also run a food truck, which is named YA-TR’EE-YAN (“a gathering of people around food” or “feast” in Dee-ni) and offers free meals to students and tribal members during the summer. They serve some recipes from my cookbook, too, with Native ingredients like venison, elk, salmon, and sablefish.

I’ve heard Native foods described as the first cuisine of the Americas and the last to be discovered. All these different Asian and European cultures are represented in the U.S., but until recently people wouldn’t even say there is a Native cuisine. Coming up, I didn’t have any Native chefs to look up. Telling that story, at the restaurant and to my students, has been something I’ve really tried to do.

I was raised on the Siletz reservation in central Oregon by my grandmother and grandfather. I enjoyed growing up in a small town. It felt safe; you knew everyone; there was no traffic. There was the forest where you could run around a little bit, and the river for fishing, and this place called the play shed, where I played basketball. You got to experience different sports because there weren’t a lot of kids—they needed everybody to make a team.

One of Strong’s signature dishes at JORY: Pan-roasted Skuna Bay King salmon with a salmon skin chip, set on sunchoke purée and quinoa and topped with cranberry relish and radish microgreens. (Photo credit: Kari Rowe)

My grandma would tell me stories about the history of our family and tribe. There was a time when we were a recognized tribe. Then, from the 1950s to the 1960s, the U.S. government eliminated federal status for tribes. We lost all federal recognition, access to land, resources, benefits. We call that the “termination” period.

What we have now in Siletz is a mere fraction of what our original land was. We moved here from our ancestral homelands, which are primarily from Southern Oregon into Northern California.

Termination was a tough time for our tribe, but they continued to fight to be recognized as a sovereign nation again and have land to create a home that would be ours for generations. Many tribal leaders made trips to Washington, D.C., to speak in front of Congress on our behalf, including my grandfather, who was on our tribal council as well as being a war veteran. In 1977, we regained federal status.

I was fortunate because as I grew up, the tribe started do more culturally important activities that we hadn’t done during termination. Our community started what we call “culture camp” that we still do every year over a weekend. They were teaching the youth things like basketry making and preparing eels to eat. My grandma would tell stories about teaching herself everything—like her amazing beadwork —and was a big part of making sure I went to that camp to learn about our culture.

“Friends and family knew there was always some kind of meal happening at the Strong house.”

My grandfather passed away when I was ten, but growing up, my grandmother was working and he was retired, so I originally started cooking for him. It was basic stuff that I learned from my grandmother—who cooked everything from scratch for us—and I learned I had a love for being in the kitchen.

I got into fishing as a young teenager. The Siletz River runs through the town and reservation, then it joins the ocean in the Siletz Bay. Growing up, I’d see salmon and steelhead trout spawning in the river.

My family was connected with seafood. My uncle was known for his smoked salmon—he would barter with smoked salmon like currency. He’d dig for clams and mussels, too. My other relatives worked in seafood processing. They would bring my grandma salmon heads. She would boil them and eat all the parts—the eyeballs, the cheeks. Later, in my first job out of culinary school, I did a lot of seafood butchery, and we would break down all of our salmon, and I’d bring the heads to her as gifts.

I’ve been asked quite a bit throughout my career about my grandma’s cooking. Her time was so much about survival. It was being taken from your homelands and away from your native foods. Growing up toward the end of that in the ‘80s, we were still on commodity foods—the flour and fats and sugars that were given to us. One of my first early times helping her in the kitchen was making noodles from scratch for chicken noodle soup.

Friends and family knew there was always some kind of meal happening at the Strong house. It was never just us eating by ourselves—it was always people coming over. I had this connection that food equates to taking care of other people, it gives you a sense of home and community.

My Culinary Influences

My first job was in high school at a fish-and-chips place in Newport, along the coast, 20 minutes away. It was a husband and wife who owned it, and they were mentors for me. He would go down to the boats on the bay front and get fresh fish, bring it back, and teach us how to fillet it.

I learned to appreciate fresh products and also the basics of hospitality, like cleanliness and multitasking, and how to interact with guests and the importance of being a strong player to support the team.

Afterwards, I enrolled in a two-year hands-on culinary program at Lane Community College in Eugene, and then at a local restaurant. That chef asked me to do a dish that might speak more to my culture.

I thought of fry bread, which was such a big part of our culture, but also came out of survival. My chef was Jewish, so I made a play off of lox and bagel with fry bread and cold-smoked cured salmon lox. That was probably the first-ever dish highlighting some part of my culture. That’s when I started to do what I do now every day.

After eight years at the restaurant, I started to get itchy. I wanted to try something else. I got an offer from the Phonecian Resort, near Phoenix, that had over 1,200 employees—more staff than people who lived in the town I came from. Arizona was the opposite of Oregon. Here, it’s beautiful and green and wet. There, it was dry and sunny every day. It was completely different from what I was used to. It was overwhelming, but I grew quickly there because I was like a sponge, absorbing everything.

I learned about the foods from the other beautiful tribes around there—the Navajo, Hopi, Gila River, Tohono O’odham. They’re all so different, and they’re all based off of place. Southwest foods include so many different chiles, beans, and corn—all Native foods. It was just so clear to see how these foods have sustained people for generations.

Students at the Siletz Valley School culinary program butchering local albacore tuna. (Photo credit: Rachelle Hacmac)

My Local Foods

After many years of working in Arizona—including at the Sheraton Grand at Wild Horse Pass, on the Gila River Reservation, and KAI, which is influenced by the food of the Akimel O’odham and Piipaash peoples—I ultimately came back to the Northwest to be close to family. Now, at The Allison in Newberg, I get to highlight Native foods in the kitchen and garden. I really love that—it’s my culture and home, and it’s nice to be able to share all the great things that come from here.

My role as a chef is about taking care of others, nourishing people. I’ve always felt like my part in this ecosystem is to support the farmers, the fishermen—to put money back into community.

If you’re getting any kind of tribal foods or just even local foods, usually they’re not really set up with infrastructure, so it takes extra effort on your part. At JORY, the fine-dining restaurant at The Allison, we use a lot of local.

“I’ve always felt like my part in this ecosystem is to support the farmers, the fishermen—to put money back into community.”

We have local fishermen through Northwest Fresh Seafood, which is a cute little fish shop right in Newberg. Our meats all come from Northwest Premier Meats nearby in Tualatin—her name’s Tina, and she takes care of us. Our cheese is from Briar Rose Creamery, 15 minutes away. Bread comes from our baker, Tim, at Carlton Bakery. We get our mushrooms and huckleberries and black and white Oregon truffles from Misty Mountain. We have a guy down at Oregon Royal Sturgeon, which is in the Fort Klamath area, and their fish is so fresh. For special events I might get something specific, like the Ozette potatoes from the Makah tribe up in Neah Bay, Washington, which I get through a gentleman who works for the Northwest Native Chamber.

Our produce is from local farms or our 1.5-acre garden, and last year we grew some Ozettes too. Anna, our master gardener, is so cooperative and passionate about what she does. We recently planted miner’s lettuce out there, which is a Native food. I do this dish called The Allison Garden, with a “soil” out of dark rye bread and vegetables stuck in that soil, with greens on the side. I use the miner’s lettuce as part of this dish.

Reconnecting With Native Traditions

Growing up, our Siletz language, Dee-ni, wasn’t taught in school. Now they have an online dictionary and programs in the elementary schools, so younger generations have access to our language. I learned what I know when I moved back to the reservation as an adult, going to once-a-month classes and coming home to put sticky notes on objects in the house. I mostly use our language around food—for things like lhuk (salmon), gus (potato), or ch’aa-ghee-she’ (egg)—especially on menus, because it relates to me that way.

When I was young, as far as I’m aware, the tribe wasn’t really foraging for traditional foods like huckleberries, and camas was only for ceremonies. Now every year I go picking huckleberries on tribal lands, and they’re one of my favorite foods. We serve them often at The Allison. You can go savory or sweet with huckleberries, and I’ve worked with the pastry chef, Shelly Toombs, to develop a huckleberry semifreddo.

My Work With Native Youth

In 2024, I got a message from Patrick Clarke, the director of the Siletz Valley School culinary program, which started the previous year. He said, “You should come out to the school and meet the kids sometime.”

I invited the class out to The Allison for a field trip tour of the garden and kitchen, followed by lunch and a Q&A. The class of about 20 students got to learn about cooking and other aspects of hospitality, including marketing, housekeeping, HR, accounting, admin—all these different jobs you can have under one roof at a place like The Allison. They asked me questions about my path and my advice for them. I feel like my path into the culinary world is very approachable, very driven by taking care of others and just pushing yourself to be the best you can.

It could have been just the one tour, but Patrick and I kept talking. Next, the school hosted me. They made lunch and gave a tour of the school and their food truck. The kids used the recipe out of my cookbook for fry bread, and I hopped in the food truck to make it with them.

Since then, a lot of what I do with the culinary program is giving them opportunities to learn and connect with other Native chefs—like at the Native American Heritage Month event we hosted at The Allison last November. The students helped with everything, from prep days to shucking oysters that night.

“I do whatever I can to give them experiences. The more experiences they have, the bigger and better picture they’ll see.”

I try to give them a path toward a good career in the kitchen, about being happy in what you do. But I’m also very transparent about the difficulties. You’re going to work holidays and your birthday, and you’re going to be taking care of others on their special days. It can be long days of physical work.

Siletz is a small town with no stoplights, a thousand people, and really no business besides a mini-mart gas station—unless you work for the tribe, and those jobs are limited. So it’s really all about exposure to new things. That’s half the battle—getting out of Siletz a bit and seeing what’s in the world. I do whatever I can to give them experiences, like going up into Portland and being part of the governor’s conference [in April 2025], feeding lawmakers and representing the tribe. The more experiences they have, the bigger and better picture they’ll see.

Last month, there was an event called the Blue Foods Forum in Portland, all focused on foods from the ocean. The kids cooked Oregon albacore and supported the chefs, including helping with a plating for a demonstration I led with tribal-caught salmon from Iliamna Fish Co.

Through the Oregon Albacore Commission, they also got to go out on a boat—which I know for some kids was their first time. They received a donation of whole albacore tuna that they learned to butcher. As part of the lesson, they took the fish heads and other parts of the skeletons and buried them to help create a natural fertilizer, as part of this full-circle journey so that nothing goes to waste and everything stays in the ecosystem.

It was like one of the times, as a kid, that I came back home with trout for my grandma. I didn’t clean the fish at the river, and she reprimanded me. She was happy I had caught trout, but she was like, ‘You need to gut those at the river. You need to wash the inside of their flesh with the water. All of what you cleaned out is going to be eaten by the crawdads and all the other life that’s in the river, and that’s part of the process.’ With the students learning how to break down albacore after the boat trip—that was their teaching moment of how everything is connected.

It’s really impressive to see how far some of the students have come. The program gives them direction; it pushes them to see what they can do, and it benefits the school and the community. I try to do whatever I can to support the students. For the past two years at JORY, we’ve had a special dish on the menu that highlights traditional Siletz foods, with some of the proceeds going towards the culinary school program.

I really connect with the youth in Siletz. As someone who came from that school, I understand what those kids are going through, what their opportunities are. For me, it’s personal—I can say: “I’ve sat where you’re sitting.”

This conversation has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

The post ‘Native Foods Have Sustained People for Generations’ appeared first on Civil Eats.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/37912

In the last five years, Indigenous agriculture has received attention in academia as an alternative model, though on a smaller scale, to modern farming systems. Research has shown that some traditional farming systems, such as growing maize, beans and squash together, protect soil health, reduce biodiversity loss and support Indigenous knowledge, known as traditional ecological knowledge.

How many of these elements from traditional farming can successfully translate into larger crop production models, when little research defines their economic value, is a question Kamaljit Sangha, a researcher in ecological economics at Charles Darwin University, wanted to explore in a new study published earlier this month in the journal Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems.

“How do we take it from the perspective where there are holistic and multiple values [of Indigenous farming], which are mostly hidden in the current way of measuring the importance of these food systems?” said Sangha. “The key message we wanted to get out is that if we highlight the non-monetary values of these food systems, we hope that this can attract more attention from policy decision makers and governments to support these indigenous peoples and local communities’ food systems.”

When assessing how many publications include rigorous empirical evidence to measure potential scalability and sustainability for Indigenous farming systems against mainstream agriculture, “there is a gap between advocacy and evidence,” the report read.

In the study, Sangha and Charles Darwin University researchers found that when reviewing 49 published research articles on Indigenous peoples and local communities, known as IPLCs, most literature highlighted the benefits of communities’ traditional farming practices. This comes at a crucial vantage point, as global industrialized agricultural systems are swept up by climate change risks. The study also found a lack of research examining the quantitative productivity and scalability of IPLC farming, an area Sangha hopes to see more literature on in the near future.

It’s estimated that a 35 to 56 percent increase in food production, achieved while suspending land clearing for agricultural use, is vital to feeding a projected 10 billion people by 2050. As climate change has emerged as a threat, food producers are looking to these reliable traditional forms of farming.

As average temperatures climb, climate change is decreasing biodiversity, altering nutritional values and degrading soil health. These effects are disrupting global food production and Indigenous food systems alike. Currently, food systems are responsible for 26 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.

Sangha said this review couldn’t be done without acknowledging the impact of colonialism on traditional farming. “In countries like Australia, a lot of food practices Indigenous people have carried in the past have been severely impacted, and in many other countries as well,” she said. The expansion of “mainstream food systems” has resulted in changes to Indigenous communities’ diets and the widespread loss of knowledge needed to carry these practices on to future generations.

The study also argues that merging the two systems, rather than viewing them as opposites, is required to tackle the climate crisis. With government investment and targeted policy, IPLC agriculture can build a resilient wall against threats driven by climate change, while modern farming industries can learn from these traditional ways of growing food. Otherwise, both systems face the loss of ecological, economic and cultural resources.

“Beyond market value, IPLC farming systems generate substantial non-market economic contributions by reducing household expenditure on food, medicine, fibre and fuel,” the report read. The review suggests that government funding and support can provide larger food producers with a look into how to address growing challenges caused by climate change and the impacts of fertilizers on soil health.

In 2024, the United Nations Global Biodiversity Framework Fund ratified investments to dedicate 20 percent of its resources to support IPLC initiatives to improve their lands and conserve biodiversity. Yet, a global commitment to specifically fund efforts to conserve traditional food systems is so far missing.

“If we highlight these non-monetary values of these food systems, and they’re important for policy decision-making, we hope that this can attract more attention from policy decision-makers and governments to support these Indigenous peoples and local communities’ food systems,” Sangha said.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Modern agriculture is collapsing under climate change. Indigenous farming has answers. on Mar 26, 2026.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/37245

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for their newsletterhere.

Katie Surma
Inside Climate News

MAIKIUANTS, Ecuador — By the time Olger Kitiar reached the ridge, his shirt was wet with sweat, clinging to his back. Built with the solid frame of a linebacker, he moved through the rainforest with a quick, even rhythm that defied the steep, slick climb.

Then he froze.

“Stop,” he hissed in Spanish, his hand snapping up.

Jhostin Antún, a few steps behind, halted mid-stride. To an outsider, the trail ahead looked like any other patch of churned Amazonian mud—slick, brown and dense enough to swallow a boot. But Olger’s eyes, trained by a lifetime in the Shuar territory of Maikiuants, saw it instantly. He squatted down, pointing to a deep, four-toed indentation. The track was fresh. And massive.

“Jaguar,” he whispered, a grin spreading across his face.

The print belonged to a cat bigger than the female they’d recorded on a camera trap in October, one month earlier. The men photographed the imprint carefully, not as a memento, but for legal evidence.

Maikiuants, perched high in Ecuador’s southeastern Amazon highlands near the Peruvian border, sits atop copper-rich ground now claimed by Solaris Resources, a Canadian mining company seeking to gash an open-pit mine into these mountains. If extraction moves forward, the forest Jhostin and Olger were walking through—home to endangered species, waterfalls, medicinal plants, generations of Indigenous knowledge and undiscovered beings—could be permanently altered.

The jaguar’s presence here holds weight as a matter of law. In Ecuador, endangered species—and nature more broadly—have legal rights. The government must clear a far higher bar than under conventional laws before approving projects like large-scale mining.

Jhostin and Olger are paraecologists, people who document life in their homelands using generations of ecological expertise and scientific methods. They work with Ecoforensic, a nonprofit that trains paraecologists—paramedics for ecosystems—to document how ecosystems function and how they are harmed. Ecoforensic works in places in Ecuador like Maikiuants: biodiverse regions where scientific data is thin or nonexistent.

The data paraecologists collect, such as species inventories and water samples, is then translated into evidence that carries weight in courts. Increasingly, it’s winning cases.

In 2023, in Ecuador’s Intag Valley, community paraecologists helped halt a proposed mega copper mine by documenting threats to endangered species that the company’s environmental studies had failed to account for. The ruling hinged on Ecuador’s “rights of nature” laws, enshrined in the country’s constitution in 2008.

Those laws rewrote the legal status of ecosystems, transforming them from property or objects—like a car or a microwave—into living subjects with rights to exist, regenerate and maintain their vital cycles. Since then, courts have repeatedly applied those rights, siding with forests, rivers, marine ecosystems and wild animals, and thwarting large-scale extractive activities that judges found would harm them irreversibly.

But like any right, nature’s rights are not absolute.

Ecuador, among the world’s most biologically diverse countries, also holds enormous reserves of oil, copper, gold and other minerals. Global markets want them. Multinational companies are itching to dig. And a cash-strapped government is eager to sell. The legal battles are intensifying.

The Ecuadorian Amazon near Limón Indanza. (Photo by Katie Surma)

Ecoforensic is helping to prove that the rights of nature can go toe to toe with those forces. The work now underway in Maikiuants may be its most consequential effort yet.

For Jhostin, Olger and the rest of Maikiuants’ 480 residents, the outcome is existential. Protecting their territory, Jhostin explained, is inseparable from protecting their own lives—they are nature protecting nature. If the forest is destroyed, so are the people who live within it.

Their people did not migrate to this region. They are from here. Every generation before them was born on this land, a continuity that Jhostin, 21, says his grandparents impressed upon him as a responsibility. His elders’ message was simple and unambiguous: This place must be defended.

Now, that duty rests with him.

That’s why the two paraecologists step carefully around the jaguar’s tracks and continue climbing toward a camera trap tucked deep inside their forest. The device has been silently recording for weeks and they are eager to see what it captured.

Thousands of Mining Concessions

Days earlier, a white pickup truck had wound down the Amazonian mountainside above Maikiuants, its wiper blades squeaking as they swept away the rain.

Inside, British ecologist Mika Peck tapped the brakes, peering through the windshield as dense fog closed in. His wife, Inde Kaur Hundal, squeezed the bar above her seat, bracing against a pothole the size of a bathtub. The co-founders of Ecoforensic were on their way to deliver good news: The organization will establish a permanent research station in Maikiuants.

It had been two years since they first sat down with residents there to talk about Ecoforensic. They had met in a wooden community center featuring a mural of a Shuar warrior spearing a colonist. For over an hour, the community had grilled the couple. They wanted to know what Ecoforensic would do with the data paraecologists produced—and whether Peck and Hundal were just more outsiders there to extract knowledge, then disappear with it.

Most of all, they wanted to know how Ecoforensic could help protect their territory.

The Ecuadorian government had been carving up Shuar territory into mining concessions since the 1990s, but the threat had been confined to maps and paperwork until 2019. That was when Solaris Resources acquired the Warintza Project. Since then, the company’s mineral exploration subsidiary has been a constant presence, scouring the region for copper and gold while attempting to win over a handful ofnearby Shuar communities that would be displaced or otherwise impacted, their ancestral mountains blown up.

Maikiuants was a wall of resistance. But communities facing extractive giants fight an almost impossible battle, with financial, political and legal power stacked against them. In Ecuador’s Amazon, that’s been the story of oil for decades. Now, mining is the new frontier.

Ecuador’s rights of nature laws offer communities a fresh and powerful legal foothold, but winning court cases requires rigorous ecological proof. That was the gap Ecoforensic was built to fill, Peck told Maikiuants’ residents during that first meeting.

Peck and Hundal were inspired by a landmark 2021 rights of nature ruling by Ecuador’s highest court, a case that defined how nature’s rights in Ecuador could be enforced. The decision centered on Los Cedros, a protected cloud forest.

The government granted a Canadian company a mining concession in 2016 covering more than half of the forest, despite its protected status. Local residents and scientists challenged the decision using decades of ecological research.

Some of that evidence came from Peck’s own work. Through a paraecologist project he launched in 2005, local researchers documented critically endangered brown-headed spider monkeys in the region. That effort formed part of a broader scientific record showing that more than 240 near-threatened, vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered species lived in Los Cedros—many absent from the company’s environmental impact studies used to justify its operations.

That body of evidence proved decisive. In siding with the forest, the court found that mining would threaten Los Cedros’ biological integrity and disrupt evolutionary processes unfolding over billions of years.

Peck, typically stoic, cried with joy when he learned that Los Cedros had prevailed in late 2021. Then he, Hundal and their Ecuadorian colleagues went to work.

Los Cedros had benefited from a dedicated scientific research station. But vast swaths of Ecuador are, scientifically speaking, a black box—and they are also threatened by mining.

Peck did the math: The Ecuadorian government had granted nearly 8,000 mining concessions as of 2021. Roughly 30 percent of those overlapped with protected areas, and 20 percent overlapped with Indigenous territories. The most impacted are the Shuar.

The need to proactively document Maikiuants’ ecosystems, Peck told the community in their 2023 meeting, was “urgent.”

“When the Threats Come”

On their first morning back in Maikiuants in late November, Peck and Hundal woke to the faint scent of woodsmoke in the cool air. Outside their tent, green peaks rose skyward, shrouded with forest and clouds, making the village feel held by the landscape itself.

Today, Peck’s work centers on the web of relationships that bind this place together—water and soil, fish and forest, and the people who depend on them. But early in his career, he was trained to see the world in fragments. He studied aquatic systems in isolation, looking at “safe” levels of contaminants in water, an approach that mirrors how conventional environmental law regulates pollution.

But the more time he spent measuring thresholds, the more uneasy he became with the premise itself. The idea that ecosystems could absorb endless damage as long as it stayed below a regulatory line struck him as a fundamental misunderstanding of how living systems work. Nature is all about relationships.

Peck, with close-cropped graying hair and a sinewy frame, tries to live that way too. Colleagues describe him as a rare mix of intellectual rigor and emotional intelligence—someone who listens as carefully as he measures. He instinctively looks to the communities embedded in the ecosystems he studies, a perspective that runs against conservation’s prevailing top-down approach. Real change, he believes, emerges from the grassroots.

Ecuador’s rights of nature laws took shape in much the same way, emerging from Indigenous communities who brought their legal traditions to the state and demanded recognition.

Now, a barefoot Peck, one pant leg slightly rolled up, stepped again to the front of the community center, where about 45 Shuar sat in a semi-circle. This time, the mood was light. Peck was no longer an outsider, but a trusted scientific ally.

The first order of business was brainstorming. What should the research station look like? Where should it be built? And what are residents concerned about?

They broke into small groups, scrawling ideas with magic markers across long sheets of paper. Ángel Nantip, 63, a muscular community elder with a direct and unflinching gaze, spoke first. Nantip remembers when mining engineers and the Ecuadorian military first arrived in the 1990s to prospect for metals. They told him nothing bad would happen to the territory or the spiritual beings that live within it, he said. Only later did he learn how destructive the planned open-pit mine would be—and that it would sever the relationships among communities.

Before anything else, Nantip told the group, the community needed a way to protect its environmental defenders.

“We need an alert system when the threats come,” he said, his angular face tightening.

Peck wasn’t surprised when others raised the same concern. Each week, an average of three environmental defenders—people who peacefully protect ecosystems—are killed around the world, a number widely believed to be an undercount given the remote and politically repressed places where many of them work. The sector most closely linked to that violence: mining. Maikiuants was not immune.

Since Solaris arrived, the largely tranquil region had grown tense, driven by what leaders describe as a “divide and conquer” tactic. Mining companies secure the backing of certain communities or leaders with financial incentives, often filling gaps left by the state—access to schools, health clinics or basic infrastructure. Maikiuants’ school, for instance, has one teacher for about 45 students spanning all grade levels. Two nearby Shuar communities and an umbrella Shuar organization entered into various cooperation agreements with Solaris, the contents of which are confidential.

“As independent and legally recognized communities, we have the right to seek a better quality of life for the people of our community, where our children can study, our elderly can work, and we can have access to widespread healthcare that we have never had before,” the pro-mining communities said in a court filing about their relationship with Solaris. A spokesperson for those communities did not respond to a request for comment on this story.

Though the project has advanced without the consent of all impacted Indigenous groups, Solaris has likewise framed it as community-driven.

“At Solaris Resources, we believe that sustainable mining is not just an economic endeavour; it is a journey that must include the insights and values of every stakeholder involved, especially our indigenous populations,” said company president and CEO Matthew Rowlinson in a written statement on Solaris’ website. “Their lived experiences and deep connection to the land are vital to shaping responsible mining practices.”

Solaris did not respond to multiple requests for an interview, nor did it respond to a list of questions about the project, including its impact on local communities.

On the ground, the divisions sown by the company’s presence are stark. It’s turned neighboring villages into adversaries, with pro- and anti-mining communities’ disputes with one another spilling into court battles, military deployments and threats.

In 2022, members of the two pro-mining communities filed a criminal complaint against three Maikiuants residents, including Nancy Antún, a leader of the Maikiuants women, alleging they planned an attack on a mining camp in the region. All three fiercely denied the allegation. Antún said people from pro-mining communities have themselves made multiple threats against her, including that they will burn her house down while her children are inside.

Another prominent Shuar leader said she received a death threat from a Solaris executive—an allegation the company denies. Amidst the turmoil, the government deployed military forces to protect the concession, including on Maikiuants’ territory, which Ecuador’s Constitution recognizes as self-governing. In response, community guards detained several soldiers and now face criminal charges.

Similar disputes elsewhere in Ecuador have escalated into violence. In recent years, Indigenous leaders who opposed extractive projects—including A’i Cofán leader Eduardo Mendúa and Shuar leader José Isidro Tendetza Antún, a relative of multiple Maikiuants residents—have been killed, cases that rights groups say underscore the risks faced by environmental defenders in the region.

Back in the community center, as the morning meeting ended, the path forward was clear—and fraught. In Maikiuants, building the evidence needed to defend the forest carries risks. There would be no separating the science from the struggle.

The Monkey’s Axe

In many ways, Ecoforensic shouldered the work the Ecuadorian government was meant to do: protect its people, uphold the constitution and ensure companies followed the law. Instead, successive administrations deployed the military to suppress protests over pollution, shielded foreign firms from liability for massive toxic dumping and weakened civil society’s ability to resist.

Under President Daniel Noboa, an ally of U.S. President Donald Trump, those pressures intensified. In recent months, his administration froze the bank accounts of prominent Indigenous leaders and environmentalists—including one belonging to a lawyer for Maikiuants —while dismantling the environment ministry and imposing sweeping restrictions on nongovernmental organizations.

The crackdown has made coalitions essential. Communities, lawyers and scientists are banding together as they push back against Noboa’s drive to accelerate mining and oil extraction.

Now, as the afternoon meeting got underway, Peck invited an aquatic ecologist to the front of the room: Edwin Zárate, a lanky, soft-spoken biology professor at the University of Azuay in Cuenca. In Maikiuants, Zárate was quietly helping to build the scientific record of how the territory works as a living system—supporting paraecologists, establishing an agro-ecology program and setting up a meteorological station to track the climate in real time.

Peck moved through the room, handing out spiral-bound packets thick with color photographs—frogs no larger than a thumb, fish flecked with purple and green, each image paired with a short description.

“These are the species paraecologists have documented so far,” Peck said, as pages rustled open. “And they’re discovering more.”

“Every time we do new studies, we find new species,” Zárate added. Some, he said, were unknown to science—like the one paraecologists had recently found, a frog with skin as dark as night, speckled with iridescent blue dots, like a tiny galaxy.

Maikiuants, Zárate explained, sits in the rugged transition zone where the high Andes meets the tropical lowlands. It is a landscape defined by ancient upheaval: millions of years ago, colliding tectonic plates forced the Pacific seabed upwards. Each ridge and fold created its own microclimate, isolating species in narrow ecological niches. Here, extinction can come suddenly. Destroy a single slope, he said, and an entire evolutionary lineage can disappear with it.

That fragility has legal implications. Ecuador’s Constitution gives special protection to species with unique evolutionary paths—those that exist nowhere else on Earth, representing a “one-of-a-kind” branch on the tree of life.

“Some species are more important for rights of nature cases than others,” Peck said. “Those at risk of extinction are very important—and species that exist only here.”

He turned next to keystone species, animals whose influence ripples through entire ecosystems. Jaguars, for instance, regulate prey populations, shape plant growth and feed scavengers through their kills. When keystone species disappear, food webs unravel. “The future of other species depends on them,” Peck said.

“The condor is another,” Zárate added. With wingspans stretching up to 12 feet, Andean condors are among the largest flying birds in the world. They are critically endangered in Ecuador, with fewer than 150 remaining, largely due to poaching and agricultural expansion. As scavengers, they play a vital role in disease control. A rapidly emerging threat: habitat loss from mining.

The information in the packets, Peck and Zárate explained, could give the landscape a voice, grounding nature’s constitutional rights in ecological data.

Using a small projector powered by a cable threaded through a gap in the wall, Peck cast a diagram of Ecuador’s rights-of-nature framework onto a poster affixed backward to the wall as a makeshift screen. The government’s duty to prevent species extinction appeared on an infographic, circled in red, adjacent to other constitutional guarantees.

Peck pointed to the protections for biocultural heritage—the inseparable ties between communities and the plants and animals they live with. That was something science alone couldn’t document.

“We need your stories,” he told the room. “Which species matter most to you? Why?”

The room erupted into conversation. Lead paraecologist Claudio Ankuash Nantip, who goes by Pinchu, pointed to a photograph of a capuchin monkey.

“When people die, they don’t disappear,” he said. “They return as animals.”

Those who lived badly might come back as creatures of fear. Others return as protectors.

“Like the monkey,” he said.

Nearly a century ago, Pinchu said, a demon terrorized the community with an axe, killing people. It was the monkey who defeated it, burying the axe deep inside a mountain.

Elders once saw the species often. Now it is almost gone. Paraecologists have so far been unable to document it.

“Now,” Pinchu said, “the company wants to dig the axe up.”

Dreams of a Father

The next morning, Peck, Hundal and Zárate pulled on knee-high rubber boots and tried to keep pace with a group of Shuar heading into the forest to scout sites for the research station. The group was led by Jorge Antún, 60, a lifelong resident of Maikiuants and the father of paraecologist Jhostin Antún.

Compact and powerfully built from decades in the forest, Jorge moved easily along the trail. His long-sleeved beige shirt, visibly stained with mud and sweat in the warm, humid air, clung to his torso as he climbed.

Minutes in, he stepped off the path. Reaching into the vines, he plucked a leaf and held it up.

“This is good medicine for insects that burrow into your skin,” he said, explaining how the leaves are cooked into a paste and applied to the body.

Every few steps, the forest offered another lesson. Berries used as dish soap. Plants that calm sunburn. Ants whose bites burn like fire.

“The forest,” Jorge said, his eyes bright, “is our own storage unit for food and medicine.”

That is not how mining firms see it.

Companies’ environmental impact studies—required before permits are granted—are meant to assess a project’s social, cultural and ecological risks. In practice, lawyers say, Indigenous ecological knowledge is hardly ever included. Also absent are mentions of communities’ spiritual relationships to the land, like Maikiuants’ waterfalls, which residents view as sacred temples of spiritual renewal where their futures are revealed.

Companies’ science can also fall short. Ecoforensic’s review of Solaris Resources’ environmental impact assessment identified what it called “critical deficiencies,” including the omission of 91 at-risk or endangered species and scant attention to fish—an especially glaring oversight in an industry notorious for contaminating waterways. Mining has left a global legacy of heavy-metal pollution, acidic runoff and depleted aquifers.

The assessment also had mistakes, such as its failure to include the vulnerable-to-extinction giant anteater and bush dog. Paraecologists had already documented both species on Maikiuants’ lands.

More broadly, the document never analyzed whether the project could violate Ecuador’s rights-of-nature laws. That requires evaluating impacts on ecosystem functions (the work ecosystems do to keep themselves alive, like a tree converting sunlight into oxygen and wetlands filtering dirty water); on life cycles (think of a frog’s journey from egg to tadpole to adult); and on evolutionary processes (the long-term change of life over millions of years as it adapts for survival).

Now, as Peck followed Jorge down the trail toward his home, it was hard for the ecologist to imagine company contractors producing the kind of patient, place-based knowledge needed to truly understand an ecosystem. The thought lingered as he ducked through the low doorway of the Antún family’s traditional hut.

Inside, the oval structure was meticulously kept: a swept dirt floor, a long wooden table with benches, a smoldering fire at its center. Pots, pans and a rifle hung from the walls. On a bench, two relatives, one in a dark T-shirt with her hair pulled into a loose bun and the other in a sage-green blouse, shelled peanuts into a large container while another lifted a squirming child from a colorful activity seat and brought the baby to her breast.

Jorge’s wife, Ilda Chias Nakaim Antún, handed out glasses of fresh pineapple juice and steaming plates of yucca and plantains, alongside hard-boiled eggs served with chili-flecked salt. But for the salt, everything came from the land around them.

Over the meal, Jorge spoke quietly about ideas for sustainable businesses: fish farming, fruit cultivation, even a local variety of vanilla.

“We want alternatives to mining,” he said. “We can be an example for others.”

His family is firmly opposed to the mine. His daughter Marcia Antún, the young mother, worried about air and water contamination.

“The company could force us to leave,” she said.

As the conversation turned back to economic possibilities, they discussed precedents. A cocoaproject tied to paraecologists’ work on the brown-headed spider monkey helped farmers triple their incomes by pairing market access with forest protection. Other communities turned to ecotourism. In West Papua, Indonesia, where Peck helped develop paraecology initiatives, one of the first paraecologists went on to earn a Ph.D. and now leads the Binatang Research Center, Papua New Guinea’s leading conservation research institute.

In each case, the model produced something durable: livelihoods tied to ongoing scientific work, not extraction.

Reliable internet, now possible through satellite services, could open paths to e-commerce. The University of Azuay’s business school might help with planning. Jorge also imagined sharing the Shuar’s medicinal knowledge with the world, on their own terms.

“I have dreams for my family,” he said. “But I’m afraid I won’t be able to fulfill them because of the company.”

Time was not on their side. Solaris Resources’ final operational approval was expected within months.

Sustaining Life

Later that day, lead paraecologist Pinchu, who told the story of the monkey’s axe, set out on a narrow trail climbing out of Maikiuants, his 10-year-old son Kirup and Zárate following close behind. The forest tightened around them, the canopy draping over the path like a botanical cloak that choked out the midday sun, the air warm and faintly sweet with the scent of ripening fruit. They walked in silence until Pinchu signaled for everyone to stop.

A five-foot-long snake, no thicker than a golf ball, lay stretched across the path, its dark body blending into leaves like a shard of obsidian.

“It’s sleeping,” Pinchu whispered.

He picked up a fallen branch and shook it above the snake. Unhurried, the animal stirred, slid off the trail and vanished into the undergrowth.

Farther on, the forest began to open. Sunlight pierced the canopy in narrow shafts, and then, suddenly, the trail opened into a hidden alcove. A waterfall spilled over a jagged ledge of dark rock, unraveling in thin silver strands into a lagoon below. Thick vines draped overhead like green tresses.

Kirup grasped one of the vines and slid smoothly down to the lagoon, diving in. Zárate and Pinchu followed, wading toward a small island carpeted in soft green moss. There, Pinchu pulled out a container of tobacco leaves steeped in water. Among the Shuar, the mixture isn’t smoked but inhaled as a tea—a practice Pinchu said brings calm and sharpens his connection to the forest, helping him listen and feel more deeply.

Waterfalls hold deep spiritual significance for the Shuar. When life’s challenges arise, they follow protocols refined over generations, preparing carefully before visiting, communing with and leaving these places.

Only recently has Western science begun to affirm what many Indigenous communities have long understood. Time spent in nature has been shown to lower stress hormones, reduce inflammation, strengthen immune response and sharpen focus.

Yet the places where such scientific findings carry the greatest authority are often those most disconnected from the natural world—and whose consumption is driving the destruction of ecosystems like this one.

The copper beneath these mountains would likely be shipped to the United States and other wealthy countries, feeding the expansion of military hardware, energy transitions and infrastructure behind the artificial-intelligence boom, such as data centers.

A conventional data center can require up to 15,000 tons of copper. Facilities built to power AI systems can demand more than three times that amount, driving prices to record highs.

Those artificial worlds feel impossibly distant here, where now, a dripping wet Zárate emerged from the lagoon. This marked the 12th trip he’d made to Maikiuants, each one reinforcing for him the importance of scientists stepping out of walled offices and learning from other knowledge systems.

“We have to be more holistic,” he said.

The industrialized world, Pinchu added, has “a different way of viewing nature—only thinking about money.”

He dreams of a future in which his people can evolve and develop without losing the essence of who they are.

“We have ways of living that are also valuable,” he said. “Our ancestral knowledge is valuable, and it’s not about money—it’s about sustaining life.”

Love and Hope

With the fresh jaguar tracks documented, Jhostin Antún and Olger Kitiar quickened their pace toward the camera trap, anticipation building with every step. They were high in the mountains now, far above the waterfall where Pinchu had taken Zárate.

The camera was fastened to a tree washed in sunlight—a deliberate choice, since it ran on solar power. When Olger reached for it, pure delight sparked in his eyes.

“I love this,” he said. “I love seeing all the animals—sometimes there are things we haven’t seen in real life.”

He began transferring the data to his phone using Bluetooth, a 10-minute process that felt far longer. To pass the time, they scrolled through older recordings: pig-like peccaries rooting through the undergrowth, a spectacled bear lumbering past, turkeys, a species they call wild dogs, perdiz birds—and a jaguar, caught once, briefly, slipping through the frame.

This camera was one of two they maintained on their territory. The other required an eight-hour hike each way and an overnight stay in the forest.

“It’s still as exciting as it was in the beginning,” Olger said. “We’re learning more and more and discovering new species.”

Jhostin had been part of the team that discovered an unknown frog, soon to be named the Maikiuants frog.

His work, he said, was both fun and deeply serious. Gesturing with his hands, he described the rhythms of daily life—planting, harvesting, eating what the forest provides. Agriculture, for his community, is not a commercial activity but a way of sustaining the body and spirit.

“Ecoforensic gives me hope that this way of life can still be protected,” Jhostin said.

He wants children someday, and he wants them to live in the forest without fear, free of contamination. Without territory, he said, you cannot teach children who they are. You cannot teach them the forest.

He wants a future of buen vivir—living well, living in balance. His father, Jorge, taught him the forest by walking through it, by explaining what each plant and river meant. His grandfather did the same, offering guidance not through lectures but through nature itself. That, Jhostin said, is where wisdom comes from.

And that is what he is trying to protect.

Olger signaled that the data had finished loading. The footage showed a lone tinamou, a chicken-like bird.

Their task finished, the two paraecologists walked back to the village—crossing a gushing, pristine river on the way, its banks alive with hundreds of iridescent blue butterflies rising and falling in slow waves.

On a narrow bank of stones and sediment in the middle of the river, where the water divided and came together again farther down, Jorge Antún sat quietly, taking in the sweep of forest and sky. Jhostin spotted his father and smiled. He and Olger crouched at the river’s edge, splashing the cool water over their faces before cupping their hands to drink, the current threading around them as it always had.

The post In the Fight to Defend the Amazon, This Indigenous Community’s Secret Weapon Is Science appeared first on ICT.

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Twin Sisters Native Plant Nursery, jointly operated by West Moberly First Nations and Saulteau First Nations in northern ‘B.C.,’ converted from propane to biomass heating a decade ago. Now, West Moberly First Nations plans to go even greener — growing food in greenhouses heated by geothermal energy from deep underground. Photo courtesy Government of B.C./Flickr

This story was originally published by The Narwhal here and is reprinted with permission and minor style edits.

Moldy strawberries, wilted lettuce. A forlorn cauliflower pocked with brown.

West Moberly First Nations Coun. Clarence Willson jokes that produce available in nearby stores is sometimes “compostable” before it hits the shelves.

That produce arrives by way of a very long supply chain, and their northeastern “B.C.” territory, a three-and-a-half hour drive northeast of “Prince George,” is often the end of the line.

And thanks to the compounding effects of hydro dams, seismic lines for oil and gas, forestry and coal mines, traditional foods the nation has long harvested or hunted have grown increasingly scarce or unsafe to eat.

“We have to start looking at how we sustain ourselves,” Chief Roland Willson of West Moberly First Nations says. “Not just West Moberly, but the people in the northeast.

“The idea of the greenhouse is, to me, where I think we have to go.”

Chief Roland Willson, of West Moberly First Nations. Photo by David P. Ball

‘We want to be in control of our supply of food’

Growing fresh food year-round in greenhouses could improve food security in the community and across the region, but it would take a lot of energy, too.

Fortunately, the First Nation has a serendipitous asset buried deep underground: scalding hot, salty water.

Thanks to the province’s lively tectonic faults, it has an abundance of this underground water, a key ingredient in what’s known as conventional geothermal energy.

Hot water is pumped to the surface, using tools like turbines and heat exchangers to generate renewable electricity or direct heat.

Elsewhere, companies are working to design so-called “unconventional” geothermal technologies to extract the earth’s heat from places without such reservoirs, but the drilling required makes it much more costly.

“B.C.’s” geothermal opportunities, in other words, are a relatively low-hanging fruit — one that could literally yield fruit, and other fair-weather crops like tomatoes and peppers, even in winter’s subzero temperatures.

“British Columbia has a world-class geothermal resource,” says Emily Smejkal, a geologist and policy lead for the Cascade Institute’s geothermal energy office.

“We’re just not using it.”

Geothermal energy supplies consistent power, making it similar to the hydro dams and natural gas “B.C.” currently relies on.

If the nation’s project succeeds, the West Moberly direct heat geothermal greenhouse project would be the first of its kind in “Canada.”

Such innovation brings risks to its trailblazers, but Clarence, a longtime lead on the geothermal project, says the potential outcomes are worth it.

“When we learned about this geothermal availability, it fit right into our idea of food sovereignty,” he says.

“We want to be in control of our supply of food, knowing what goes into it and what’s good about it.”

Wilted, moldy produce like these strawberries is not an uncommon sight at grocery stores in ‘B.C.,’ especially in remote and rural areas. The province imports much of its fresh produce, and by the time the food has arrived on store shelves, it’s often past its prime. Photo by Zoë Yunker

Impacts of fragmented food systems

Fresh food used to be abundant in West Moberly’s territory.

“If you needed meat, you’d go to the mountains and get yourself a caribou,” Roland says.

Fish came easily, too: rivers were once plentiful enough that you could catch them by hand.

The nation’s members travelled throughout their territory with the seasons, maintaining balance and keeping their impacts in check.

Over a century ago, “Canada” signed Treaty 8, which promised signatory First Nations would retain the right to hunt and fish as they always had.

But that’s not what happened.

To supercharge resource extraction in the north, former premier W.A.C. Bennett dammed the Peace River, bisecting the once-expansive migration of transient caribou that fortified the residential herds.

“Caribou that roamed throughout the territory got fragmented down into these small, little pockets,” Roland says, “and then wolves came in.”

Wolves and other predators made use of roads — and seismic and power lines etched across the territory, offering them an easy-access escalator to the caribou’s mountain hideaways.

As logging and mining further depleted caribou habitat, the herds plummeted.

In 2014, the nation launched a breeding pen program with the Saulteau First Nations, and yet herds remain in critical condition.

Other foods suffered, too: moose and elk populations fell, thanks in part to habitat loss and to new hunting pressure in the caribou’s absence.

Berries throughout the territory were sprayed with glyphosate, a chemical now deemed “probably carcinogenic” by the World Health Organization.

For decades, fish remained relatively plentiful — and critical to diminishing food security.

Every year in May, Clarence and his family would gather at a special spot along the Crooked River to fish for char, sometimes setting up barbecues to cook by the river as they worked.

But worries began to surface, thanks in part to a sign in the Hudson’s Hope post office warning of elevated mercury levels in the Williston Reservoir.

The nation knew that fish travelled through the reservoir, and initiated a study in 2015 to determine whether they were safe to eat.

“I was in tears when we got the results back, because I knew my family had been eating those fish for years,” Clarence says.

Ninety-eight percent of the samples had mercury concentrations above provincial health guidelines.

Women of childbearing age could safely eat only a Hershey’s Kiss worth of fish every other day.

Char like this Dolly Varden species populate the Crooked River in northeastern B.C. and have long served as a vital food source for West Moberly First Nations. But the impacts of mining and logging in the area have contaminated the water, leading to unhealthy mercury levels in the fish. Photo courtesy of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Site C dam raised the stakes — and the risks

Before it was flooded, the community learned that BC Hydro’s new dam project, Site C, would bring mercury contamination closer to home.

The reservoir is downstream of the Moberly River, which threads through the nation’s territory and flows into Moberly Lake directly facing their community.

Just as the Crooked River carried the reservoir’s toxins upstream, the Moberly River is poised to do the same.

“A lot of us eat fish directly out of the lake,” Clarence says.

“They went ahead with Site C with the full knowledge that it was going to do the same thing there.”

Clarence added that selenium pollution from nearby coal mines also impacts the region’s watersheds. “All the river networks in our region are affected by something,” he says.

With many traditional food sources depleted or contaminated, West Moberly has taken action over the years to regain access to fresh foods.

The nation funded community members to build garden beds, but short growing seasons mean they offer limited respite to a year-round problem.

A greenhouse could bridge the seasons, but West Moberly First Nations has no natural gas service in its community.

And according to Michael Keefer, president of the ecological restoration consultancy Keefer Ecological, the added costs of using electricity to power a greenhouse year-round would make the prospect a non-starter.

“It’s very energy-intensive to heat a greenhouse,” he says.

That is, unless the nation has another energy source to draw from.

The Site C dam on the Peace River. Photo courtesy BC Hydro

Energy from an ancient sea-floor

Hundreds of millions of years ago, the earth’s supercontinent broke up along the border of northeastern “B.C.” and “Alberta,” turning it — and what would become West Moberly’s traditional territory — into a shallow tropical sea, populated by giant reptilefish.

Eventually, sediment and rock covered it over, leaving little holes underground where that sea-floor had been.

“If that buried sea-floor doesn’t hold air anymore, it holds salty water or oil or gas,” Smejkal says. Known as “brine,” that water is more plentiful than its fossil fuel cohabitants.

“Oil and gas are hard to find,” Smejkal says. “Water is actually pretty easy.”

In addition to that ancient sea-floor, “B.C.’s” geothermal potential also abounds beneath the chains of volcanoes tracing its coast.

There, hot water comes from rain that trickles underground through porous rocks, heated by the volcanoes’ pimple-like proximity to the earth’s molten core.

Some “B.C.” buildings use a geothermal-lite technique called “geo-exchange” to supplement their energy needs by heating water in shallow underground pipes, but to date no projects have successfully tapped the potential of deep-buried water.

Glen Clark, chair of the BC Hydro board, said he thinks the province’s lacklustre geothermal industry is due in part to an abundance of cheap hydropower and gas.

“You’ve got these inexpensive fuel sources that have impaired, in a way, the kind of experimentation you’d have if the price were higher,” he says.

But Clark says geothermal is “a really, really important resource,” that could play a key role in “B.C.’s” energy system in the future.

Producing electricity from underground water is also finicky: it needs to be super hot, at around 120 C.

But industrial sites like greenhouses can easily skip the electricity step, using geothermal heat directly in their operations, creating a less risky project.

When West Moberly realized the heat in their geothermal resource was ideal for greenhouse conditions, it seemed like an obvious conclusion, Clarence says.

“That’s been a topic we’ve discussed for years,” he says.

West Moberly First Nations’ existing greenhouse nursery has been heated with biomass fuel for a decade. The community hopes to start growing food in geothermal-heated facilities in the future. Photo courtesy of West Moberly Corporate Alliance

Next phase of geothermal project is risky

If all goes as planned, West Moberly’s geothermal greenhouse will bring fresh produce and fish back to the territory.

Using a system known as aquaponics, the nation plans to raise fish in tanks and use their waste to fertilize vegetables in the greenhouse, cutting down on or eliminating the use of synthetic fertilizers.

“The waste from the fish is excellent fertilizer for the greenhouse products,” Clarence says.

“They work together very well.”

So far, the nation plans to raise fish like tilapia alongside produce like tomatoes, strawberries, greens and peppers in a 40,000-square-foot greenhouse — enough to provide food for its members and surrounding communities.

Keefer is working with the nation to develop a business plan, including reaching out to local grocery stores. He’s confident their products will be in high demand — as long as everything goes according to plan.

Even though the project is designed to produce a more forgiving form of direct heat, the enterprise still brings risk.

“For our project, flow is our big worry,” Ben Lee says.

He’s an operations engineer and heat transfer specialist with Calgary-based company Raven Thermal Services, which is helping to design the geothermal project with the nation.

If the company doesn’t find enough water in the reservoir it targets, it won’t be able to bring enough heat to the surface, and may need to drill farther into the rock to access it, upping the project’s costs.

Lee says they chose to locate the project next to an abandoned oil and gas well near the community, which can serve as a pre-drilled test plot to assess subsurface conditions they might encounter.

This is among the many conservative decisions made, Lee says, to reduce risks inherent in the project.

“When you’re talking about a community-based project,” he says, “risk management becomes absolutely critical.”

West Moberly First Nations’ geothermal greenhouse plans are inspired by similar projects throughout the Westland region of the Netherlands, such as this greenhouse operated by the B.L. de Bakker & Zn nursery in Wateringen. Photo by Jeroen van Luin/Flickr

‘Trying to have good food here’

Having received early feasibility funding from federal and provincial governments, the project now requires substantial new funding to take on the next big step of drilling the hole to determine how much water is there.

In countries where geothermal energy has boomed, Smejkal says that risk-taking has often been a shared enterprise.

For example, in what’s known as the “glass city” — the Westland region of the Netherlands — geothermal-powered greenhouses produce food for distribution across Europe.

There, governments agreed to help compensate for the cost difference between geothermal power and natural gas, and offered an insurance program to reduce risks for geothermal projects.

By removing the consumer carbon tax and failing to provide consistent support for geothermal energy, Smejkal worries “Canada” is heading in the opposite direction.

Clark sees a role for the utility to advance geothermal in the province and help to reduce risks for developers.

But, he warns, it faces competing demands for funds and time, including major substation investments to replace aging infrastructure.

He says he wasn’t aware of West Moberly’s geothermal greenhouse project, but added that the utility generally enters into equity agreements with First Nations to share ownership of the energy system, like transmission lines, “as opposed to more historic reparations.”

He added that he didn’t know enough about the mercury issues related to Site C to comment on them.

In an interview from his home alongside Moberly Lake, Clarence says those responsible for the community’s collapsing food system are indebted to help.

 “Some of these people that are poisoning our food supply,” he says, “they should help us with trying to have good food here.”

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The recent acceleration of Israel’s plans to illegally annex the occupied West Bank has coincided with a major surge in settler violence against Palestinians

Illegal Israeli settlers continued their violent attacks across the occupied West Bank on 23 March, after several destructive pogroms targeted Palestinian villages over the weekend.

Palestinian farmers and shepherds in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron, came under attack by settlers on Monday.

“Muhammad Yahya Abu Aram, 35, and Elias Saeed al-Amour suffered from suffocation and fainting after colonists sprayed them with pepper spray following an attack on shepherds and farmers in the western part of Al-Rakeez village in Masafer Yatta,” anti-settlement activist Osama Makhameh told WAFA news agency.

Groups of settlers also uprooted scores of olive trees in Beita, south of Nablus, on Monday, while also raiding a school in Huwara – spray painting graffiti on the walls and replacing the Palestinian flag with an Israeli one.

Overnight, a health clinic in Burqa, east of Ramallah, was torched by settlers.

As the war on Iran rages and Tehran continues its large-scale retaliatory campaign against Israel, extremist settler violence against Palestinians – which was already at an all-time high – is now surging.

Israeli settlers rampaged through multiple Palestinian villages in the occupied West Bank overnight on 21 March, smashing cars, burning homes, and attacking and injuring Palestinians who were defending their homes.

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Donald Warne, MD, MPH
Oglala Lakota

A proposed federal policy change could have profound health consequences — especially for tribal and rural communities. The proposal from the U.S. Department of Education would exclude public health and nursing from a new definition of “professional degree programs,” and could potentially affect eligibility for scholarships and financial aid.

As a physician, elected member of the National Academy of Medicine, public health leader, and Oglala Lakota community member from Pine Ridge, South Dakota, I am alarmed by what is at stake.

Public health is arguably one of the most impactful professions. The greatest gains in life expectancy over the past century are largely due to public health advances — clean water, vaccination, tobacco control, maternal and child health — not medical care alone. To redefine these degrees in a way that diminishes their professional standing ignores their historic and present-day impact.

Especially concerning is how the “professional” designation and its implications for federal loan eligibility, impacts students. If public health and nursing lose that status, middle- and lower-income students will lose access to the funding that makes a graduate degree possible.

As is so often the case, the burden of this change would not fall evenly. Rural communities already suffer from too few trained public health and nursing professionals. This workforce gap will increase if this policy passes, and result in greater medical costs for rural states and regions. When people have to use emergency rooms for care for illness and injury that could have been prevented by upstream public health measures, it drives greater economic, social, and human capital costs to society.

My Indigenous students often come to public health organically: they’ve seen programs  for diabetes, vaccination, mental health, and smoking reduction that improve quality of life for their families and relatives. The urgency became disastrously clear during the COVID-19 pandemic. They are motivated to pursue higher education because it will help them best serve their communities, which face some of the nation’s highest rates of chronic disease and preventable mortality.

Workforce demographics are not symbolic — they directly affect quality of care. When health professionals share cultural understanding and lived experience with those they serve, the improved trust and communication results in better outcomes. In Indian Country, where health disparities are rooted in generations of underinvestment and structural inequity, we cannot afford to weaken the pathway for developing Indigenous public health leaders.

This issue is personal for me. My mother was a public health nurse who dedicated her life to caring for our community. Watching her work showed me that public health is both a calling and a career. But a calling alone does not pay tuition. If mission-driven students cannot afford the education required to improve health outcomes, our workforce will become even more fragile and unsustainable.

I’ve dedicated over 10 years to developing the world’s first Indigenous-focused Doctor of Public Health program because we need trained public health leaders who are accountable first and foremost to their communities. Policies that reduce financial access move us in the wrong direction.

As policymakers consider this change, I would ask: What is the benefit? I have not seen a clear justification. If the goal is to save money, this approach is shortsighted — student loans get repaid, and investing in public health professionals yields measurable returns through stronger communities, reduced downstream health costs, and lives saved. What I do see is risk — to workforce development, to health equity, to affordable health care, and all of these risks would be borne disproportionately by Native and other rural communities.

At a time when tribal and rural health systems are already stretched thin, we should be strengthening — not restricting — the pathways into public health. I urge the Department of Education to revisit this proposal and I call on lawmakers to hold them accountable to that end. Our communities depend on it.

About the author:  Donald Warne, MD, MPH, is a professor in International Health and co-director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Indigenous Health. He is an acclaimed physician, one of the world’s preeminent scholars in Indigenous health, health education, policy and equity, as well as a member of the Oglala Lakota tribe from Pine Ridge, South Dakota. He is also Johns Hopkins University’s provost fellow for Indigenous Health Policy. The author’s views are his own and not those of Johns Hopkins University.

This opinion-editorial essay does not reflect the views of ICT; voices in our opinion section represent a variety of reader points of view. If you would like to contribute an essay to ICT, submit your op-ed here.

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Amelia Schafer
ICT

PORCUPINE, S.D. — Laughter, hope and resilience echoed through the walls of Pine Ridge’s newest domestic shelter, operated by nonprofit Where All Women Are Honored, as it opened its doors on Feb. 23.

For roughly 17 years, since the closure of previous shelter Cangleska, domestic violence victims seeking shelter had to drive over 90 miles to Rapid City for shelter or over an hour to the neighboring Rosebud Reservation if its White Buffalo Calf Women’s society had space.

Across Indian Country, despite disproportionately high rates of domestic violence and violence against women, there are only 55 Indigenous-focused domestic violence shelters compared to 575 federally recognized tribes, according to the National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center. This lack of safe houses and shelters can directly tie into the high rate of missing and murdered Indigenous women nationwide, said Norma Rendon, Oglala Lakota and the founder of Where All Women are Honored.

Advocates for Where All Women Are Honored pose for a photo at the grand opening of the new shelter in Porcupine, South Dakota. (Photo by Amelia Schafer, ICT)

Leaving an abusive relationship isn’t easy, it takes a lot of courage to leave, and adding the need for a vehicle for travel to Rapid City or friend to drive there can add to the fear victims may experience when planning their escape, advocates said.

Over half of American Indian/Alaska Native women have experienced intimate partner violence in their lifetimes, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

From 2020-2023, at least three people have been killed as a result of domestic violence on the Pine Ridge Reservation, according to data provided to ICT from the South Dakota Department of Health’s Violent Death Reporting System. The Violent Death Reporting System’s statewide data collection started in 2020.

“It’s very sad because it’s not our way of life,” Rendon said.

Three years ago, roughly 2 miles north of the new shelter, 19-year-old pregnant woman Ashton Provost, Oglala Lakota, was shot and killed by her boyfriend McKenzie Big Crow, 20. Big Crow was found guilty of Involuntary Manslaughter, violating the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, and Possession of an Unregistered Firearm following a three-day jury trial in Rapid City, South Dakota in 2025.

During the trial, Provost’s family testified that she had been a victim of domestic violence prior to her death.

Homicide rates for American Indian and Alaska Native women are more than ten times the national average in some counties and overall, 2.8 times higher that of White women, according to a study by the National Congress of American Indians.

While opening the shelter, Rendon acknowledged the Indigenous people killed as a result of domestic violence, and her hope that this shelter can prevent future deaths.

“I think it plays a vital role,” Rendon said. “If we can get together to develop a policy and protocols, we can help keep our neighbors safe and our relatives safe.”

Rendon herself is a survivor of domestic violence. Rendon said she escaped an abusive relationship in 1977 in Minneapolis, after which she began meeting with other survivors in her community and working to create a support network and eventually her organization.

Where All Women Are Honored is the first full-service shelter on the reservation since 2009. The tribe does have its own victim services shelter, however, it’s not currently operational, representatives said.

The home, in a rural, remote portion of the Pine Ridge Reservation, is guarded by rolling plains, remoteness and security cameras. Rendon said organizers are working to employ a fulltime security guard as well.

Norma Rendon addresses attendees of the grand opening for the new shelter in Porcupine, South Dakota on February 23. (Photo by Amelia Schafer, ICT)

It’s equipped with a swimming pool, playground equipment and wooded area home to chokecherries and traditional medicines that residents can gather as needed. With five bedrooms, Rendon said the shelter can accommodate up to five families (one per room) and provides space for overnight emergency shelter if it’s over capacity.

“The numbers for domestic and sexual and violence that is happening on Pine Ridge can be staggering,” said Amanda Takes War Bonnett, Oglala Lakota and the Public Education Specialist at Native Women’s Society of the Great Plains. “Sexual violence especially is a silent epidemic here that has consequences that affect our family structures, schools and economy.”

And there isn’t accurate data on how present the issue is, Takes War Bonnett said. Not all cases of domestic violence are reported to law enforcement and often, accountability doesn’t happen.

“There are thousands and thousands of dollars that are being funneled through grants and organizations to Pine Ridge for prevention, awareness and advocacy but one key piece is having a place of safety to go when escaping violence or needing to refocus and heal,” Takes War Bonnett said. “In opening this shelter, Where All Women Are Honored is going to offer women and their children that key piece for safety and to heal.”

The violence directly ties back to the generational trauma experienced during the boarding school era and colonization as a whole, Rendon said.

“It’s [generational trauma] like a blister, that wound eventually has to open up and seep out,” Rendon said. “And that’s what it’s done now. All those wounds have seeped out and so our sexual assault is a learned behavior and it just increases more and more. And the same with domestic violence.”

Founded in 2018, Where All Women Are Honored has an office space in Rapid City, South Dakota that’s served as their homebase for several years. For a period of time, the organization had a makeshift shelter in the Sioux San Hospital, a former segregated tuberculosis clinic for Native Americans on the west side of Rapid City. After the hospital was torn down in 2022, Rendon said the group was unable to secure a new space for a shelter.

After that, Rendon said the group shifted gears to operate as an outreach organization, all while working towards the goal of making a shelter in Pine Ridge someday.

In addition to its new shelter and outreach programs in Rapid City, Where All Women are Honored also provides educational programs for youth to learn what a healthy relationship looks like and how to be a good partner.

Rendon said the group also works to help get victims on their feet again and able to find housing of their own and a job. From there, Where All Women are Honored will help victims access groceries, hygiene products, counseling and other essentials as they continue on their healing journey.

“It’s up to them what they want to do, where they want to live, because it’s not my program, it’s theirs,” Rendon said. “We help get them reestablished, and we continue to work with them. And we tell them that you’ve got this. Look what you’ve done so far. But we still stay in touch because they’re just getting established.”

All of this is in an effort to help prevent victims from going back to their abusers, Rendon said.

“There’s a study that says [victims return] seven to eight times,” Rendon said. “In my experience, it’s nine to ten times before they finally leave. Or if the abuser gets help and really wants to change and really wants their family.”

The shelter is open to any victim in need, regardless of gender or whether or not they’re Native, Rendon said.

“It’s, you know, Where All Women are Honored,” Rendon said. “Mitakuye Oyasin, we are all related. So a non-Native woman can come here and get help just like anybody else.”

Rendon said the outreach program in Rapid City will continue its operations and even is able to transport victims to the shelter in Pine Ridge if needed.

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Anna Kaminski
Kansas Reflector

Originally published in Kansas Reflector.

TOPEKA — Kansas acquired land nearly a century ago that is home to some of the state’s oldest buildings, but the state now faces an ownership challenge from the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation, raising questions about how history is preserved and who is represented.

The Shawnee Indian Mission State Historical Site was a Methodist boarding and manual labor school for hundreds of Native American children from across the country from 1839 to 1862. The site today hosts three historic buildings — one of which is a museum accessible to the public — surrounded by kept grounds, wooden benches, herb and native plant gardens, and a winding creek.

The Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation wants the land conveyed to itself so it can create a site for cultural revitalization, language preservation and ceremony, said Joseph Rupnick, chairman of the nation.

The buildings on roughly 12 acres of land represent a painful history, Rupnick said at a Thursday legislative hearing.

Such boarding schools were notorious for forcing Native American children to assimilate to settlers’ way of life. Physical punishment was often levied against children, including at the Shawnee mission school, and abuse was common at government-run schools.

“The land today carries the weight of those memories,” Rupnick said.

Rupnick, who said he attended two government boarding schools, said transferring the land to tribal ownership would provide justice and healing, and it would honor the relationship between the state and sovereign nations. He envisions a collaborative preservation effort, incorporating multiple tribes that include descendants of children who went to the school.

But the state has not appeared interested in Rupnick’s vision.

“We remain the best steward for the site,” said Patrick Zollner, the executive director of the Kansas Historical Society.

The state has planned preservation efforts of its own, and it led the charge to establish the buildings as a national historic landmark in 1968. The state, the city of Fairway and the Shawnee Indian Mission Foundation announced in 2022 a plan to conduct a ground penetrating radar study to locate potential gravesites. That plan hasn’t yet come to fruition.

The state acquired the land, which sits in present-day Fairway, in 1927 by eminent domain — the first and only time it has used such a method, Zollner said. At one point, the city of Fairway wanted to build a new city hall on the grounds, according to historical records.

The West building at the Shawnee Indian Mission State Historical Site on March 6, 2026, in Fairway, Kansas, is in need of repairs. It is one of the state’s oldest buildings. (Photo by Anna Kaminski)

The site’s east building is a museum, run by the city. It contains artifacts from the time the school was open, along with descriptions of life and living conditions there.

“Some Native Americans accepted mission education as necessary for their children to live in a white world,” one placard read. “Others resisted.”

The school was not a place for traditional Native American education. Teachers threatened and physically punished children, and life at the mission was meant “to change the way children acted and thought,” according to museum displays.

Mostly Shawnee and Delaware children went to the mission, but children from more than 20 other tribes also attended. Boys were trained to be farmers and girls were trained to be housewives, displays said.

“Children were put into American clothes. They were forbidden to speak their native languages,” a placard read. “If they arrived without an American name, they were given one. Individual achievement, not group cooperation, was praised.”

“Its purpose was explicit: to assimilate Native children, to suppress their languages, cultures and identities,” Rupnick said.

The site was home in 1855 and 1856 to offices for Kansas’ first territorial legislature, or the “Bogus Legislature,” a crucial precursor to “Bleeding Kansas,” cementing the land’s reputation as one of the state’s most prized historical sites.

Sen. Adam Thomas, an Olathe Republican, introduced Senate Bill 518 in late February on behalf of the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation. It marked at least the third attempt in recent years to shift ownership from the state to a tribe.

In 2024 and 2025, the Shawnee Tribe, which is headquartered in Oklahoma, supported legislation in the House to transfer ownership to its tribal government, citing improper use of the facilities and a contracted architect’s report that showed buildings in distress.

On Thursday, Rupnick relied on the same report that indicated the site’s east building desperately needs repairs, which the state has vowed to address.

Sen. Tory Marie Blew, a Great Bend Republican, saw pictures of the building, and said at the Thursday hearing “it doesn’t look safe.”

Repairs are going to cost millions, she said, questioning whether the state could take on the cost.

Opponents, including Zollner and members of the Shawnee Indian Mission Foundation, reiterated a concern that the state’s relinquishment of ownership would lead to erasure.

Foundation leaders described the tribe’s interest in ownership as a “critical threat.”

Under the agreement proposed in SB 518, the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation would pay for the site’s conveyance and take over ownership in July 2028. The bill contains restrictive covenants to prohibit gaming on the land and conditions to prohibit surrounding land from being used to build a casino.

Sen. Larry Alley, a Winfield Republican, said he was concerned stable funding would cease if public ownership was eradicated.

He was not ready to advance the bill Thursday. Instead, he encouraged compromise. He proposed the two sides meet and discuss potential solutions that involve all historical perspectives.

Rupnick said he was willing to discuss the site’s future opponents, as long as any meeting is open to all federally recognized tribes that want to be involved.

“There has to be some sort of an agreement that makes sure that we are not erased, the sacrifices there were not erased. Part of that was built by our kids’ backs,” Rupnick said.

He added: “We want to make sure we have a very strong voice in whatever is adopted or pushed forward.”

Alley said he visited the site ahead of the hearing. He held up a thick packet of paper he said contained the names of children who attended the school. He said he saw names of Native children carved on the attic ceiling in one of the buildings.

“The names are preserved in record,” Alley said, “and I was very impressed with the records that are being kept for both (of) the historical events that have happened at the entire site.”

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Yereth Rosen
Alaska Beacon

Originally published on Alaska Beacon.

Ten conservation groups have sued the Trump administration over its decision to remove decades-old protections from 2.1 million acres of federal land in Interior Alaska.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Anchorage, targets the Department of the Interior’s action to overturn public land orders dating back to the early 1970s that protect a portion of the corridor around the 800-mile trans-Alaska oil pipeline.

The department’s decision, finalized on Feb. 25, allows the state government to take over the land and open it to development. Potential uses for the land include construction of the controversial Ambler Access Project, a proposed 211-mile road through the Brooks Range foothills to an isolated mining district in northwest Alaska, and a long-proposed pipeline megaproject that would ship natural gas from the North Slope.

The lawsuit alleges that the Department of the Interior violated several laws with its action by failing to hold any public hearings in affected communities, failing to provide justification for removing long-established protections from “iconic areas of northern Alaska” and other lapses.

The laws cited in the suit are the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976, the National Environmental Policy Act and the Administrative Procedures Act.

The 2.1-million-acre corridor and the areas around it are “profoundly important to Alaska’s wildlife and people,” the lawsuit says. It supports 25 different species of fish, including salmon, and holds habitat for migratory birds, moose, caribou and a variety of other species, making it important to subsistence food harvesters and recreational visitors, the lawsuit says.

In a statement, the plaintiffs cited mining development as a particular threat to natural resources and the people who depend on them.

“The Trump administration conjured up flimsy and vacuous reasons about ‘putting America first’ to try to justify transferring public lands out of federal management to benefit billionaires,” said Bridget Psarianos, senior staff attorney with Trustees for Alaska, the nonprofit environmental law firm representing the plaintiffs.

“The Trump administration’s destructive obsession with giving away our public lands for the benefit of mining companies has forced us to go to court,” Matt Jackson, Alaska senior manager for The Wilderness Society, said in the statement.

The administration’s action poses special threats because the corridor now stripped of protection lies between Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the plaintiffs said.

Revoking protections that had been in place for half a century is “a blatant effort to avoid national environmental laws to allow construction of a road that will enrich foreign mining companies and harm wild lands, Alaska Native communities, and America’s conservation legacy,” Jim Adams, senior Alaska director of National Parks Conservation Association, said in the statement. “Ending these public land orders also exposes the entire eastern side of Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve to state management practices along its border that devalue park wildlife and the needs of rural residents.”

The Department of the Interior declined to comment on the lawsuit filed Tuesday.

Promoting ‘Energy Dominance’ agenda

When he announced the action on Feb. 20, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said it will help achieve President Donald Trump’s goal of “unlocking opportunity for American Energy Dominance.”

“By opening these lands, we are empowering Alaska to chart its own course and develop energy, minerals and infrastructure that strengthen America’s security and prosperity,” Burgum said in a statement then.

At the time, Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy and the state’s all-Republican congressional delegation hailed the decision as important to the state’s resource-extraction-based economy.

“Alaska has a right to produce, and Alaska has a right to benefit from our God-given resources,” U.S. Rep. Nick Begich. R-Alaska, said in a joint statement issued by the delegation.

But the Tanana Chief Conference, an organization of Interior Alaska tribes that is not part of the latest lawsuit, condemned the administration’s action.

The decision was made without necessary tribal consultation, and it could strip federal subsistence-harvesting protections from important food-gathering sites, TCC said in a statement.

“This decision opens the door to development that puts our lands, animals, waters, and subsistence resources at real risk,” TCC Chief and Chairman Brian Ridley said in the statement. “For our communities, these are not remote acres on a map. These are the places where our families hunt, fish, and gather to feed our people. Protecting these resources is critical to our food security, our culture, and our future.”

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(Photo: Julia Taubitz on Unsplash.)

ACT MP Todd Stephenson misuses the concept of free speech in his stance on the Nursing Code of Conduct, writes Professor Dominic O’Sullivan.

ACT MP Todd Stephenson’s campaign against “Treaty and equity obligations” in nursing and other professional codes of conduct is not really a defence of free speech.

In reality, he is effectively arguing that Māori people shouldn’t get the same quality of care as everyone else.

Let me explain.

The Nursing Council’s draft code is out for public consultation. It proposes banning nurses from using “offensive”, “inflammatory”, or “ill-informed” language in social media posts. The intention of the ban is to ensure that nurses don’t use disinformation to harm others, as in the anti-vaccination movement, for example.

Todd Stephenson is right to say that the Nursing Council needs to be cautious about doing this. The language in the draft is vague. The thresholds for what counts as breaching the code would need to be clarified to protect lawful free speech. This is important and the Council has work to do.

But Stephenson goes on to say: “The problem is made worse by the draft code’s expanded Treaty and equity obligations.”

The code’s references to Te Tiriti are, in fact, minimal. They require nurses to treat Māori patients equitably, meaning those patients get the same opportunity for positive outcomes as anyone else.

There is extensive evidence that not all nurses, and not all health professionals, give everyone the same quality of care. Rachael Walker and her colleagues provide just one example. They showed that racism contributed to inequitable outcomes for Māori people requiring kidney transplants. They write:

“Reported experiences of racism in Aotearoa New Zealand are consistently associated with negative measures of health, self-rated health, life satisfaction, and reduced access to high-quality healthcare with subsequent poor health outcomes.”

Unrestricted free speech would mean nurses are free to say that they don’t want to treat Māori patients equitably. They might say this explicitly. They might use offensive and inflammatory language to make their point. Either way, they’re saying they want to do harm to some patients.

For these nurses, Te Tiriti stands in their way, and that’s why it matters.

Te Tiriti supports the Nursing Council’s statutory responsibility for patient safety, which is essential for people to have trust and confidence in the health system.

The idea that it doesn’t matter how nurses speak to people, or what choices they make about whose care to prioritise and whose values to respect and offend, is to remove humanity from healthcare. It also explains how and why racism contributes to ill-health.

Professor Yin Paradies and his colleagues reviewed 293 studies, mostly from the US and other high-income countries, which found that racism is consistently associated with poorer health.

So this is not just a New Zealand problem. We should, of course, be free to argue that Te Tiriti doesn’t provide the best response to this problem. But it is quite another thing to argue that we don’t need a response at all because, in Stephenson’s words, it is equity objectives that are the problem.

To connect Te Tiriti to the right to quality care is far from “embedding race-based or ideology-driven” practices into healthcare. Racism, by contrast, is ideologically driven.

A nurse who pretends that colonialism isn’t real, and that racism doesn’t help explain relative Māori ill-health, can’t approach a Māori patient with the care and respect that positive outcomes require.

Te Tiriti doesn’t use the word race, and Māori people don’t routinely refer to themselves as a race, either. That is other people’s language. Whakapapa, culture, and colonial context are what matter, and they are vastly more complex.

Despite Stephenson’s framing, Te Tiriti hardly features in the draft code. It says that nurses should “Recognise Māori as tangata whenua and uphold their rights under Te Tiriti o Waitangi”. One could rightly say that this is vague, and expect problems of interpretation to follow. However, the code’s next sentence is explicit. It says nurses should “Take steps to reduce health inequities and address the ongoing impacts of colonisation”, one of which is racism and its impact on people’s opportunities for good health.

The Nursing Council is not a private club. It regulates a profession to assure the public that the people it registers can practice competently. To say that it should be selective when it carries out this task, applying it to some people but not others, is exactly the kind of outcome that Te Tiriti protects against.

In this respect, the Pharmacy Council’s Competence Standards are more explicit, requiring pharmacists to contribute to reducing health inequities and to understand how Te Tiriti might help achieve this.

In my forthcoming book, Te Tiriti, Equality and the Future of New Zealand Democracy, I argue that Te Tiriti helps because it’s concerned with how authority and responsibility are shared to support fundamental human equality.

Te Tiriti contributes to better health outcomes because it says that government (kāwanatanga) exists to serve the interests of all people, not just non-Māori. And the Nursing Council, while independent, is part of the machinery of government.

Kāwanatanga should work equally well for everyone because it belongs equally to everyone. This is how Article 3 constrains the powers of government when it says that Māori people may exercise citizenship with equal tikanga. Rangatiratanga sits alongside by guaranteeing Māori rights over their own affairs, including the protection and development of culture as part of good health.

Te Tiriti is important to healthcare because it respects Māori spaces of ownership and influence — including spaces of influence over how health systems work, and the objectives they should follow.

Importantly, Te Tiriti protects culture because without culture, we are devoid of humanity.

Culture matters, not as a source of privilege that takes away other people’s rights to good health outcomes, but as a matter of fundamental human equality. Te Tiriti helps frame what that equality means in practice.

For example, it gives Māori the same opportunity as other citizens to influence how health systems work — whether those are independent Māori health systems or state systems. It gives Māori the same opportunity as other citizens to influence the regulation of the nursing profession and to define what is required to fulfil the Nursing Council’s statutory obligation to “protect the health and safety of the public”, set “standards of clinical and professional competence”, assess “the fitness of practitioners to practise”, define “scopes of practice”, and manage “disciplinary processes”. Māori should also have the same opportunity as other citizens to decide whether these are the most suitable regulatory criteria.

Contributing to these tasks requires accepting that kāwanatanga doesn’t belong to Pākehā alone. Kāwanatanga is the shared authority of citizens. It belongs to everyone because it is everyone, and free speech is an equal right. Māori people are entitled to think and contribute to public decisions in ways that make cultural sense, for purposes that make cultural sense, and to respond to the colonial context.

When Australia considered free speech laws in 2014, the Attorney-General told parliament that people have “a right to be bigots“. But is this a threshold we can accept if we really believe nurses should care for everyone equally well? It’s hard to see how someone who wants to offend and inflame social tensions can have the skill and big heart that Stephenson said are the main qualities a nurse needs.

Yes, free speech means people are entitled to critique interpretations of Te Tiriti. People should be free to object to the state’s chosen path. Māori and other nurses have always done this to argue for better quality care.

But to say that it’s reasonable for nurses to argue against equitable care is to argue against the profession itself.

Dominic O’Sullivan (Te Rarawa and Ngāti Kahu) is a professor of political science at Charles Sturt University, adjunct professor at the Auckland University of Technology and Victoria University of Wellington. Dominic is the author of nine books, includingTe Tiriti, Equality and the Future of New Zealand Democracy, which Auckland University Press will publish in June 2026.

E-Tangata, 2026

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This article by Patricia Calvillo originally appeared in the March 13, 2026 edition of El Sol de San Luis.

Indigenous communities of the Tének and Nahuatl ethnicities in the Huasteca region of San Luis Potosí have raised their voices to express their rejection of any oil and gas exploration and extraction project that involves the use of hydraulic fracturing, commonly known as fracking, in the region. In a statement addressed to the President of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo, representatives of these communities warned of the environmental, social, and cultural risks that they assert would result from implementing such projects in their territory.

The document was issued in recent days from the municipality of Tancanhuitz de Santos, in the Huasteca Potosina region, and is addressed to both the federal government and national and international public opinion. In it, the communities express their concern over what they consider a change in the government’s commitment to prohibiting hydraulic fracturing, a technique used to extract hydrocarbons from complex geological formations.

The signatories of the statement point out that fracking consists of injecting fluids at high pressure to fracture the rock and release gas or oil trapped underground, although the possibility of using water recycling systems has been raised, they warn that the technique involves inherent risks such as the release of methane, the possible generation of induced seismicity and the production of toxic waste derived from the process.

According to the communities, the official discourse has presented the extraction of national gas as a strategy for energy sovereignty; however, they maintain that the development of unconventional deposits in Mexico depends largely on technology, machinery, and specialized services from foreign companies, mainly from the United States, which in their view would maintain a form of technological dependence.

Communities also argue that proceeding with such projects without their consent would violate the rights of Indigenous peoples recognized in the Mexican Constitution and international treaties. They cite Articles 1 and 2 of the Constitution, as well as Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization , which establishes the right of Indigenous peoples to be consulted in a prior, free, and informed manner about projects that may affect their territories.

One of the central points of the statement is the impact the technique would have on water, a fundamental resource for life and the economy of the region. The Huasteca region is known for its abundance of rivers, springs, and other bodies of water, but community representatives warn that the extraction processes require large volumes of fresh water to begin operations.

According to the document, the first stage of fracking would require millions of liters of water that would have to be extracted from local rivers or aquifers; in addition, they mention that recycling the water used in the process is not completely efficient and generates residual sludge that may contain hazardous chemicals.

The communities point out that the project would directly affect 3,268 localities where mostly Indigenous Tének and Nahuatl peoples live.

They question the feasibility of installing oil projects in areas far from populated areas, as has been suggested in some technical presentations. In the Tampico-Misantla Basin region, there is a high density of rural and Indigenous communities, meaning that virtually any project would be located near agricultural areas or water sources.

The potential impact of this phenomenon is not limited to the environmental sphere. Communities point out that the project would directly affect 3,268 localities inhabited primarily by indigenous Tének and Nahuatl peoples, populations that have historically faced poverty and marginalization.

They believe that the introduction of extractive projects could profoundly alter the social and economic fabric of the region, affecting traditional activities such as small-scale agriculture and access to natural resources on which numerous families depend.

Communities say economic development cannot be built on the dispossession of Indigenous territories or on environmental degradation.

Another point of concern is the risk to existing bodies of water in the area. According to the communities , there are at least 1,019 rivers, springs, aquifers, and other water bodies in the region that could be directly or indirectly affected by mining activity.

Furthermore, soil disturbance and potential contamination could trigger a process of environmental degradation that would affect local biodiversity. The Huasteca region is considered to be of great biological richness, with flora and fauna species that form part of the country’s natural heritage.

The communities also argue that proceeding with such projects without their consent would violate the rights of Indigenous peoples recognized in the Mexican Constitution and international treaties. They cite Articles 1 and 2 of the Constitution, as well as Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization , which establishes the right of Indigenous peoples to be consulted in a prior, free, and informed manner about projects that may affect their territories.

Given this situation, they have decided not to give their consent to the strategic plan that contemplates the exploitation of hydrocarbons in the area, nor to any initiative that may affect their territory, their culture, or their natural environment.

The statement also affirms that the Huasteca region should not be considered a sacrifice zone for energy projects and maintains that it is a living ecosystem and a territory with a millennia-old cultural history that requires protection, not exploitation.

Finally, they formally requested a direct meeting with President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo to establish a respectful and direct dialogue about the future of the region. They stated that economic development cannot be built on the dispossession of Indigenous territories or on environmental degradation.

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This article originally appeared in the March 10, 2026 edition of Proceso.

The Zapotec community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag, an indigenous town nestled in the Sierra Norte of Oaxaca, which became a national and international point of reference when they denounced the sports company Adidas Mexico for cultural appropriation for presenting the “Huarache Oaxaca Slip-On” model, by designer Willy Chavarría, without their authorization, has maintained a process of recovery and protection of its cultural wealth since 2023.

The struggle of this community is not only focused on the controversy of a unique model or prototype of huarache called “Huarache Oaxaca Slip-On”, whose design bears similarities to the traditional huaraches of the community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag, Oaxaca, but it goes back to the recovery of their official Zapotec name that they had lost in 1877.

Over the years, Villa Hidalgo Yalálag has also compiled a catalog of its niches, chapels, hermitages and churches that are part of the community, as confirmed by the municipal authorities of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag and their legal advisor Juan Maldonado Vargas.

In addition, they reported that the Municipal Register of Pets, cats and dogs, has been created to maintain control for public health purposes.

Maldonado Vargas states that the objective is for the community to have a catalog with its elements of Cultural, Natural, Material and Intangible Heritage, such as its dances, music, traditions, gastronomy, clothing, crafts and of course its natural spaces.

The sports company Adidas has joined these community projects for the protection of the cultural wealth of Yalálag and although no one has confirmed the version, it is known that in the main access of the community past its church of San Antonio de Padua, construction work is being carried out on what appears to be a sports complex.

It is worth remembering that on August 2, 2025, at the San Juan Museum of Art in Puerto Rico, during a musical concert, a unique model or prototype of huarache called “Huarache Oaxaca Slip-On” was presented, whose design bears similarities to the traditional huaraches of the community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag, Oaxaca, made in a handcrafted way, by the different families that dedicate themselves to the production, from a Yalalateco, to entire families that clean, tan and prepare the hides.

The Huarache Oaxaca Slip-On: Adidas appropriated the cultural creations & traditions of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag.

The Huarache was created by designer Willy Chavarría in collaboration with the sports company Adidas México S. A de CV, who were in charge of launching and producing the Huarache according to the presentations released in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

The municipal authority, residents, and huarache artisans of the community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag were made aware of the situation, which necessitated holding various meetings involving the huarache artisans and community advisors, particularly Juan Maldonado Vargas, a descendant of Yalalteco who fulfills his role of assisting the community with various problems, in order to present a position regarding cultural appropriation or misappropriation.

The reactions from the Government of the State of Oaxaca were not long in coming. On August 4, 2025, Governor Salomón Jara Cruz and the head of the Oaxaca Ministry of Culture and Arts, Flavio Sosa Villavicencio, as well as the Oaxaca Congress, publicly declared their position regarding the cultural appropriation of the huarache by designer Willy Chavarría and Adidas, “Huarache Oaxaca Slip-On,” which bears a strong resemblance to the huaraches made in the community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag using traditional and ancestral methods.

Similarly, the federal government, through the head of the Ministry of Culture, Claudia Curiel de Icaza, and the Undersecretary of Cultural Development, Marina Núñez Bespalova, as well as the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples, made statements regarding what they considered the possible cultural appropriation of the identity elements that fully identify the community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag in the presence of the President of the Republic, Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo.

Meanwhile, in the Sierra Juárez of Oaxaca, in an act of strengthening identity, the community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag, in a community assembly, after a detailed review of all its elements, issued a statement asking for “respect and recognition of indigenous cultural intellectual property and intangible cultural heritage, respect for the ancestral knowledge and wisdom of the community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag.”

In the statement that was disseminated in the different media, they demanded a dialogue table for the recognition of the ancestral knowledge and wisdom of the production of the artisanal huarache of Yalálag with the production of the Adidas Huarache “Oaxaca Slip On”, to which they agreed.

Days later, representatives from Adidas Mexico and the community of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag issued a public apology, a document that was read in both Spanish and Yalálag Zapotec, in which the Adidas representatives humbly expressed their recognition of the ancestral knowledge and wisdom of the Yalálag community.

The public apology highlighted: “At Adidas, we deeply value the cultural richness of the Indigenous Peoples of Mexico, with the aim of engaging in direct dialogue on the points raised in your letter and exploring, together with your Authority, the steps that will allow us to move towards reparation for the damage done to the Zapotec Community of Yalálag.”

“Today, in front of the Yalalteca community, on behalf of Adidas Mexico, we offer our most sincere recognition and respect for the cultural richness of the indigenous communities of Mexico, with the profound symbolic and traditional meaning of their valuable artisanal legacy, present in the cultural representations and traditional techniques that we witness here.”

They acknowledged that the “Oaxaca Slip-On” model was conceived taking inspiration from a design originating in the State of Oaxaca, typical of the tradition of the town of Villa Hidalgo Yalálag.

The Mexican state, through its federal, state, and municipal levels of government, has been in violation of international norms and conventions since 1972, and in 2003, by failing to generate the records, inventories, registers, or catalogs for the protection of the Cultural Heritage of Indigenous Peoples and Communities, and above all, their protection. As a result, businessmen or companies, due to the economic power they represent, appropriate the ancestral elements that identify the Indigenous communities.

This is how, up to this point, it is known unofficially that the damage repair agreement continues to strengthen between the Villa Hidalgo Yalálag Community and Adidas Mexico.

The legal advisor of the Yalálag community confirmed that, for the past three years, they have been working on a process of recovering and protecting their cultural heritage.

He emphasized that on March 18, 2023, by decree of the Oaxaca Congress, Yalálag recovered its official name. In 1877, it had been known as Villa Hidalgo, as Decree 35 had discontinued the use of the town name San Juan Bautista Yalálag. Officially, its name remained Villa Hidalgo, even though the community’s identity is Yalálag. Therefore, the municipal authority and the citizens’ assembly, through a name recovery process, requested the legislative branch to officially recognize Villa Hidalgo Yalálag, as this is the name that reflects the identity of the indigenous community.

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RAMALLAH — Traffic was at a standstill outside of Nablus in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, as sunset neared and hungry residents were forced to trickle through an Israeli checkpoint to get home and break their fasts.

The Israeli military had sealed the city off from the outside world. Just over a week after the U.S. and Israel launched their joint war on Iran, Israeli settlers have ramped up their violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, and Israeli forces have imposed a near-total closure of municipal centers, shutting gates and restricting crossings without warning or perceptible logic.

“It’s so unpredictable,” said Shadya Saif, 40, a Palestinian mother of three who teaches at a private school in Ramallah. The Intercept rode alongside Saif as she traveled back to Ramallah from Nablus on Saturday, when the Israeli military closed all but one checkpoint out of the city, putting it under an effective blockade and forcing all traffic through a checkpoint called Shavei Shomron.

The unannounced closures left Palestinians scrambling. Many were visiting Ramallah to see family members during Ramadan, and they hoped to reach their destinations in time for iftar, the fast-breaking meal enjoyed at sunset. Others needed to enter the city to receive medical treatment they cannot obtain elsewhere. Saif had risked the journey to see her dying uncle and, knowing the risks of crossing, she’d left her chronically ill daughter in Nablus with him.

“I was worried I would get stuck here,” Saif told The Intercept inside a yellow “service” taxi, the only form of public transportation widely available in the West Bank. Even though nearly all of her family lives in Nablus, she has tried to avoid visiting since October 7, 2023, after which the Israeli military clamped its ubiquitous yellow gates over entry points throughout the West Bank.

[

Related

Israel Revoked Palestinians’ Work Permits — Then Launched a Deadly Crackdown on Laborers](https://theintercept.com/2025/12/04/israel-palestinians-work-permits-laborers/)

Israeli soldiers stopped each car to inspect Palestinians’ IDs. At their limit, drivers began pulling their cars onto roundabouts and driving the wrong way down the street, but the final say lay with Israeli forces, who allowed only one car at a time to approach the military installation. Some abandoned their cars to walk through checkpoints and reach their families on foot. An elderly Palestinian woman prayed aloud, saying that all she wanted was to make it safely to her family in Ein Yabrud, a village on the outskirts of Ramallah.

“I was worried I would get stuck here.”

As we sat waiting at the checkpoint, Saif’s face was filled with worry. She opened her phone to show pictures of her daughter, dressed in pink and smiling at the camera.

Saif’s daughter has muscular dystrophy and requires specialized treatment and 24-hour supervision. Saif took a big risk visiting Nablus to see her dying uncle in the hospital, she said, because if she were to get stuck there due to a checkpoint closure — which did happen for three days last week — her daughter’s health would be put in jeopardy.

“I left her with my uncle just for the day, but I have to be there to care for her,” Saif said. “I know her medications and how to ensure she doesn’t get sick.”

Saif made it back to Ramallah, but she said it would not have been possible a few days earlier.

A roadblock Israeli settlers installed on the main road between Sebastia, a Palestinian village south of Nablus, and Route 60, which connects the city to the central and southern West Bank, seen on March 7, 2026. Photo: Theia Chatelle

The day after the U.S. and Israel started attacks on Iran, the prevailing sentiment in Ramallah was anxiety. People wondered if there would be road closures and food and fuel shortages like during last year’s Twelve Day War, and whether the Israeli government would impose what Palestinians describe as collective punishment in the West Bank, even though they were not involved in the conflict.

“It has nothing to do with anything Palestinians in the West Bank are doing or not doing,” said Aviv Tatarsky, who leads an Israeli protective presence collective that organizes watches to deter settlers from invading Deir Istiya, a village outside Ramallah. “And still, there’s an Israeli decision, and life comes to a stop.”

“There is no money, no work. We are in debt, and I have four mouths to feed. What am I to do?”

Ramallah, which has long functioned as a relatively insulated bubble from the effects of Israel’s occupation, is also dealing with a struggling economy. Paired with the war, the economic downturn has muted Ramadan celebrations, according to residents who spoke with The Intercept.

“We are suffering,” said Faisal Taha, who drives taxis in Ramallah. “There is no money, no work. We are in debt, and I have four mouths to feed. What am I to do? I have been driving my taxi all day, and I have forty shekels.”

Unemployment in the West Bank is hovering around 40 percent — up from 13 percent two years ago — and GDP has contracted by 13 percent since October 7.

Dror Etkes, founder of Kerem Navot, an Israeli NGO that monitors settlement construction in the West Bank, said he was not surprised by the restrictions imposed by Israel.

“They always use instances of violence to perpetuate more violence,” Etkes said. “This is what we have seen for years, since October 7, and now it is worse than ever.”

As during the Twelve Day War last year — after which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared a “historic victory” that would “stand for generations” against the Islamic Republic of Iran — there are already the beginnings of flour and fuel shortages in the West Bank as the Israeli Civil Administration, which runs the military occupation of the territory, imposes import restrictions.

“This is not something new. It happened in June during the Twelve Day War, and it’s kicking off again,” Tatarsky said. “But what’s different this time is that Israel is also blocking roads — not only disconnecting Palestinians from Area C, but also blocking roads between Palestinian villages.”

A week later, on March 7, there was still only one checkpoint out of Ramallah open, forcing all traffic through a bottleneck that passes by the Beit El settlement and through the Jalazone refugee camp. This is the only route for Palestinians living in Ramallah to access Route 60, the main thoroughfare connecting Palestinian communities in the south to those in the north.

“They always use instances of violence to perpetuate more violence.”

Driving up the highway and passing village after village that had been closed off by the Israeli military, Etkes said it was clear the war with Iran was being used as a pretext for “a system that is meant to reduce as much as possible the area where Palestinians can move freely,” part of the settlement movements’ goal to alter the facts on the ground regarding de facto annexation.

Nabih Odeh, 63, who has been driving public transit taxis in the West Bank for more than 30 years, has watched what he describes as the slow annexation of the West Bank unfold. As he drove up Route 60, he pointed to village after village sealed off by the Israeli military.

“There, that’s Aqraba, closed,” Odeh said. “If you want to get in or out, you must walk. That’s Turmus Ayya — very wealthy — still closed.”

Eighty percent of Turmus Ayya’s residents have U.S. citizenship, yet the town was closed off, its yellow gate locked. Service taxis pulled up to drop residents off, leaving them to walk to the town center or be picked up by relatives. Its status as a wealthy American Palestinian village has no bearing on Israel’s decision.

At the same time, Israeli settlers have used the war with Iran as an opportunity to launch further attacks on Palestinian communities, largely in Area C — the roughly 60 percent of the West Bank under full Israeli civil and military control — working in tandem with movement restrictions in Areas A and B, the Palestinian-administered population centers and villages created under the 1995 Oslo Accords.

Messages circulating in settler WhatsApp groups have called for violence against Palestinians to match Israeli airstrikes in Iran. One graphic depicting a roaring lion, to match the Israel Defense Forces’ name for the military operation against Iran, reads: “It is time to launch a preemptive attack in all arenas, until the enemy is expelled from the country and subdued outside it. This time we win, once and for all.”

“I mean, generally, when you’re speaking about Israeli society, it is torn apart in so many ways,” said Orly Noy, editor at Local Call and chair of B’Tselem’s executive board. “But there’s one thing that always unifies,  and I’m speaking about the Jewish section of society, of course, and this is war.”

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Netanyahu is willing to do anything to stay in power, Noy added, and during his time in office, he has worked effectively to paint the Iranian regime as an existential threat to Israel, working in tandem with the U.S. “He has taken advantage of it very well,” Noy said.

During Operation Rising Lion, this rally-around-the-flag effect has not only served Netanyahu’s interests but also those of settlers living in the West Bank.

WAFA, the Palestinian Authority’s news agency, estimates that settler attacks have increased 25 percent since the start of the conflict. Israeli settlers have killed six Palestinians since the start of the war with Iran, including three in one incident in the West Bank community of Khirbet Abu Falah, east of Ramallah.

Israeli settlers shot Fare’ Hamayel and Thaer Hamayel, and a third man, Mohammad Murra, died of suffocation from tear gas deployed by Israeli forces.

As the world’s attention remains on Iran, solidarity activists said that Israeli settlers appear to feel they have additional impunity to conduct attacks.

“They will be treated as heroes by their supporters, by their society,” Etkes said. “And the government will do nothing about it.”

The post With World’s Eyes on Iran, Israel Locks Down the West Bank appeared first on The Intercept.

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