democracy

Today, 150 years ago, Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho warriors defeated the 7th Cavalry on the banks of the Greasy Grass River, known as the Battle of Little Bighorn.

We want to bring you along with us via live streaming today, between 2 and 3 p.m. Mountain Time. Depending on if the Internet stays available here, we’ll attempt to broadcast aspects of the commemoration via our Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. Stay tuned and join us.

Watch live on Facebook and our other social media. This was the scene as over a hundred riders entered camp, who today will help transport our awareness both back to 150 years ago, and into our future.

Yesterday, I stood on that ground with Tokata. We watched more than a hundred horses arrive — riders from across Lakota and allied nations, flags flying, knowing who we are and what we can do, carrying in their hearts that same sovereignty that nobody can take from us. It stopped me cold. The same spirit that defended freedom in 1876 is alive right now.

The Lakota People’s Law Project is here this week not just to remember. We’re here because the struggle those warriors began has never ended. Democratic rights, treaty rights, citizenship rights are still under attack. Indigenous sovereignty is still treated as optional. The U.S. Constitution is supposed to protect us all equally under the law, but it only holds when we hold it accountable and challenge authoritarians, and all inequality.

That’s our work. Legal defense, voting rights, land protection. Defending the constitutional and tribal sovereignty that tyrants in every era have tried to bury.

The warriors of 1876 understood something we must not forget: freedom is not given. It is defended, generation after generation, by people willing to stand.

You are part of that line. Stay tuned.

Wopila tanka — thank you for standing with us
Chase Iron Eyes
Executive Director
Lakota People’s Law Project
Sacred Defense Fund

I have a short, one-question quiz for you today. What does Wounded Knee have in common with Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Chicago, and Portland? At a glance, perhaps not much. But the rights and sovereignty of people across Turtle Island are now at risk as the federal government, as it did at Wounded Knee in 1890 and again in 1973, is sending armed troops into American cities to violently subjugate the people of this land.

We need to talk about this moment, what it means for our constitutional sovereignty, and what we can do about it. That’s why we’ll be hosting our next Lakota Law Membership Circle Event — Indigenous and Constitutional Sovereignty at Risk — at 5 p.m. PST on Wednesday, Oct. 29. Tokata will host, and I’ll be joined by our legal team to share our perspectives. Please become a Lakota Law member (for just $10 — the price of one fancy coffee!) to take part in this important discussion.

The invasions of left-leaning U.S. cities are not happening in a vacuum. The troops are there to accomplish three things. They’re enforcing the Trump administration’s racist and inhumane immigration policies, and they’re providing a means of distraction — a way to keep the American people from addressing, or even seeing, the corruption, grift, and scandal that should be synonymous with this version of the executive branch.

Perhaps most importantly, they’re sending a clear message that resistance, dissent, and demonstration — cornerstone First Amendment rights of our constitutional republic — will not be tolerated. Last week, Trump codified this ethos by issuing a national security memorandum that further erodes the rights of all U.S. citizens. It seeks to label those questioning the policies and methodologies of the administration as domestic terrorists — familiar territory from where I sit, as it’s exactly what happened to me and my family at Standing Rock in 2017.

The (same old) cavalry is coming, and I suggest that should be of comfort to absolutely nobody. In our homelands, it started with Custer, whom some descendants of the original immigrant settlers still love to exult and celebrate as a hero. In reality, he was a butcher of noncombatants, a gutter of women, children, and elders. His armed compatriots then earned Congressional Medals of Honor for doing the same to Native People who believed the Ghost Dance (incorporating elements of Christ consciousness) might bring about much needed shifts for our human family.

Fast forward 135 years, and our nation and our world are still badly in need of such a shift. Once again, large swathes of the population have bought into a mythology foisted upon them by the nefarious agents of the blood profiteer war machine — the main beneficiaries of government largess — at the continued expense of life, liberty, and happiness.

Many more of us are waking up to the reality that this is it; we must engage with everything we have in the existential battle to preserve our constitutional, civil, and human rights. It’s time to unite and fight! So, my relative, I hope I’ll see you on Oct. 29 to talk more about what we can and will do together to protect our sovereignty.

Wopila tanka — thank you for fighting for justice!
Chase Iron Eyes
Executive Director
Lakota People’s Law Project
Sacred Defense Fund

P.S. Please join us as a Lakota Law member today and join us on Zoom on Oct. 29 for this important online conversation!

****Please take note of the complete shift in the political landscape. It is no longer left versus right. What is happening now is the total corruption and collapse of government. The U.S. experiment in democracy is over. The U.S. government is sponsoring and supporting genocide in Gaza. The prior and the current administration is complicit. Remember this in your discussions. RM