Return Lands

March 10, 2025 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

Over the past months, we’ve shared with you about our exciting partnership with the Muwekma Ohlone people of California’s Bay Area. We’ve helped the tribe create media and, together, we designed a call to action to assist the Muwekma — proud descendants of some of California’s original inhabitants — as they seek to restore their rightful status as a federally recognized tribe.

This week, we met with the Muwekma again to discuss and help amplify another of their important initiatives: namely, returning the Presidio to their caring hands. Giving this sacred and historic land back to its original stewards would be a huge win for Indigenous justice — and it’s a real possibility in this moment of change and opportunity. Please watch the new video from the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, in which they lay out the reasons why it should happen.

Watch: The Muwekma Ohlone have the original right to the Presidio.

You may recall that, years ago, I helped to organize the #landback movement by calling to return the Black Hills to the Lakota. I was present at the protest action near Mount Rushmore when President Trump visited for American Independence Day during his first term. Today, we remain dedicated to the return of our own sacred lands — and we stand in strong solidarity with other Indigenous groups seeking the same.

Perhaps ironically, Trump’s return to office could present a new opportunity to achieve those goals. His administration’s efforts to gut the federal workforce, eliminate programs, and lessen the financial burden for the federal government could create openings for tribes to step into voids created around stewardship of federal lands. And while Lakota Law stands with needed federal workers who keep our society running smoothly, we also recognize Indigenous ownership and stewardship as the ultimate outcome for stolen, sacred lands.

As with many things these days, this is a rapidly evolving issue, and we’ll have more to say on it soon, including action opportunities and more messages directly from our friends at the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe. As always, I’m grateful for your solidarity with us and with Indigenous landback efforts across Turtle Island.

Wopila tanka — thank you for standing for the sacred.
Tokata Iron Eyes
Spokesperson & Organizer
Lakota People’s Law Project
Sacred Defense Fund

New Title: The Mahkato Reconciliation and Healing Ride

January 13, 2025January 13, 2025 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

From acknowledging the winter solstice to celebrating mainstream society’s holiday season, this time of year has always brought together gatherings of family and friends throughout Turtle Island. And every December, reminders of our history add to the difficulties faced by many families, and tribes, as some of their people’s most tragic memories all occurred during this month — the assassination of Chief Sitting Bull, Wounded Knee Massacre, and the Dakota 38 Hanging.

The day after Christmas is more widely known as “Boxing Day,” especially outside of Indian Country, but in the last several years there has been growing momentum for mainstream society to acknowledge the day after Christmas as the day when 38 Dakota “Sioux” men were hanged in Mankato, Minnesota in 1862. The hanging, the largest mass execution in United States history, was carried out in front of an estimated 4,000 people in downtown Mankato and remains largely hidden from classrooms and public knowledge.

As the year ends, and millions gather to celebrate and acknowledge the holiday season, some Indigenous communities acknowledge its tragic past through memorial ceremonies aimed at teaching and healing while building community.

The hangings were approved by former President Abraham Lincoln as a result of conflict between Dakota people and settlers in southwestern Minnesota. Dakota people were promised food and safety in exchange for ceding their lands, but they received neither, leading to attacks on white settlements in August 1862. The resulting widespread war in Minnesota lasted for five weeks, culminating in the hanging of 38 Dakota men in Mankato on Dec. 26, 1862.

Some say the Dakota War officially ended after the hanging, but the U.S. government’s oppression of the Dakota people, as well as other Indigenous groups, did not end with that atrocity. After the mass hanging, Dakota people were exiled and forcibly removed from Minnesota. Many sought refuge in Canada, South Dakota, Nebraska, and other communities willing to take them in. Memorializing such a painful history involves more than riding on horseback through blizzard-like conditions. While it remains a painful and tragic past, many have undertaken healing and positive efforts to repair relations with those in the places where history unfolded, hoping that such history will not repeat itself.

The movement to pay tribute to tragic times past is active healing in Indian Country. While memorials take time and tremendous effort, the initial memorial horse ride has caused great positive ripple. Today there are additional horse rides and a memorial run that begins at Ft. Snelling, the military fort where thousands of Dakota people were imprisoned during the Dakota War, and all convene at Reconciliation Park in Mankato, MN on Dec. 26. Many other Indigenous communities have begun to host memorial rides, runs, or walks, to pay their respects to their past, as well as to the land in hopes we continue to heal beyond times past.

Beginning in 2008, an annual memorial horse ride was organized to begin on the Lower Brule Reservation in central South Dakota and ride for 16 consecutive days, convening in Mankato, MN on Dec. 26. Their ride and ceremonial arrival to memorialize the Dakota 38 continues to this day — now under a new name — Mahkato Reconciliation and Healing Ride.

Forever riding forward, while sometimes looking back, is magic we all have to embrace in this work. We’re grateful and gain strength as we join together to honor the pain and sacrifices of the past by celebrating and supporting these ongoing healing movements.

Miigwech — thank you, always, for remembering with us!
Darren Thompson
Director of Media Relations
Lakota People’s Law Project
Sacred Defense Fund

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P.O. Box 27
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December 19, 2024 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

Apologies for the incorrect subject on this message a few minutes ago. I hope that won’t detract from this important content.

I wish you a happy holiday season! When most people think of December, what comes to mind might be the holidays we celebrate, gathering with family, and the turning of the page to a new year at month’s end. In Lakota Country, unfortunately, the end of the Gregorian calendar year is also inextricably linked with a pair of troubling anniversaries. In solidarity with us, I hope you’ll make a little room to remember them with me today.

First, Dec. 15 was the 134th anniversary of the assassination of the great Hunkpapa Lakota Chief, Thatanka Iyotake, or Sitting Bull. I, too, am Hunkpapa Lakota, and I’ll say that Sitting Bull is one of our most celebrated ancestors for good reason. To learn more, I urge you to read (or reread) this blog, which I penned last year to give you more about Sitting Bull’s life, the context of his death, and an action you can take and share to rescind Medals of Honor granted to U.S. soldiers responsible for the second anniversary I referenced: the massacre of hundreds of Natives at Wounded Knee just days later, on Dec. 29, 1890.

Photograph of Sitting Bull by David Francis Barry, circa 1883.

Tied to both of those anniversaries, I’ve been doing research and thinking a lot about the unique, historic nature of policing in Indian Country. In general, cops have never been especially friendly to us — even when they are from our communities. They have always been in direct correspondence with and there to enforce rules made by American governmental officials and corporate institutions that we all face together, even today. In turn, those entities have frequently displayed genocidal intentions and undertaken endeavors, from the Wounded Knee Massacre and the murder of Sitting Bull to railroading pipelines through our sacred lands, meant to degrade or eliminate tribal nations (or, potentially, anyone demonstrating the will to defend American lands and waters).

In our last message to you, my father thanked U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland (Pueblo of Laguna) for her service over the past four years. Let it not be lost on anyone the importance of a Native woman occupying that seat, because for many years, her department was (and sometimes still is) a great nemesis to our communities.

And that brings us back to Sitting Bull. In 1890, the Indian agent James McLaughlin, overseen by the U.S. military and the Secretary of the Interior, ordered him taken into custody. As 43 policemen and volunteers arrived that sad morning at the chief’s house and announced his arrest, a crowd of community members gathered at the commotion and began to protest. 150 Lakota arrived to protect him, and his son then led a group who attempted to free Sitting Bull from police custody.

Bureau of Indian Affairs police lieutenant Henry Bullhead and police sergeant Charles Shavehead, who bracketed Sitting Bull to prevent his escape, were shot. Mortally wounded, Bullhead then murdered Sitting Bull, shooting him in the ribs. Indian agent Red Tomahawk, who’d been behind Sitting Bull, then assumed command of the police. The ensuing fight resulted in the deaths of six police and eight Lakota protectors. After Thatanka Iyotake’s assassination, his people fled to join Spotted Elk (the brother of Iron Eyes, from whom my family takes its name). Then the band fled toward Red Cloud and the Oglala at the Pine Ridge Agency — and soon thereafter came the massacre at Wounded Knee.

These events live on with us — not just, unfortunately, as histories. As an Oglala who lives on Pine Ridge, I have witnessed police abuse in the modern day. And I have heard direct testimony and firsthand accounts of abuse of power and undue violence by Indian police over the past few decades. One example, and this is something I plan to expand on for you in subsequent messages, was the Reign of Terror on Pine Ridge in the early 1970s, which ultimately laid the foundation for the American Indian Movement’s occupation of Wounded Knee in 1973.

There is much more to say about that, and there’s so much more we can do moving forward. I promise you’ll hear more from me again soon. In the meantime, please hold us close, as you would all your loved ones at this time of year. I’m so grateful to be able to share with you, and I know that, together, we can continue to make progress. We can and we must use the often harsh lessons of the past to understand the present and create a future we can be proud of for all human beings.

Wopila tanka — thank you for your friendship!
Tokata Iron Eyes
Spokesperson & Organizer
Lakota People’s Law Project
Sacred Defense Fund

Good Thinking: Return it All

December 17, 2024 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

California land to be returned to Yurok Tribe

Rosie Clayburn is a descendant of the Yurok Tribe, which had its territory — called ‘O Rew in the Yurok language — ripped from them nearly two centuries ago.

“As the natural world became completely decimated, so did the Yurok people,” she said.

That decimation started when miners rushed in for gold, killing and displacing tens of thousands of Native Americans in California and ravaging the redwood trees for lumber.

1734393805389.png© Credit: CBSNews

“Everything was extracted that was marketable,” Clayburn said. “We’ve always had this really intricate relationship with the landscape. We’ve hunted, we’ve fished, we’ve gathered. And those are all management tools. Everything that we do has been in balance with the natural world.”

Now, generations later, 125 acres bordering Redwood National and State Parks will be handed back to the Yuroks.

The nonprofit Save the Redwoods League purchased the land in 2013 from an old timber mill, with the original goal of giving it to the National Park Service.

“As we continued conversations about the transfer of this land to the National Park Service, we began to realize that perhaps a better alternative would be to transfer the land back to the Yurok Tribe,” said Save the Redwoods League’s Paul Ringgold. “No one knows this land better. They’ve been stewarding this land since time and memorial”

Ringgold said that stewardship includes controlled burns to clear dead vegetation — a native practice once outlawed, but now recognized as essential in preventing catastrophic wildfires.

“Indigenous populations have been using fire as a management tool,” he said. “We’d like to see that kind of practice return.”

Redwoods serve as some of the largest stores of carbon on the planet. A single tree can capture up to 250 tons in its lifetime, the equivalent of removing nearly 200 cars from the road for an entire year.

But between logging and fires, 95% of California’s redwoods have been destroyed. Over the past decade, the Yurok have been helping restore the land.

Another forgotten jewel of the ecosystem is salmon. The fish were once so plentiful, they were eaten with most meals. The Yurok word for salmon even translates to “that which we eat.” But the salmon population has dwindled to about one-quarter of what it was 20 years ago, according to a coalition of state and federal agencies.

The tribe is working to bolster the fish’s population by building a stream channel, two connected ponds and about 20 acres of floodplain.

“You have salmon who provide for humans, but they also provide for other animals,” Clayburn said. “And then when they spawn and die, they put nutrients back in the ground. And so, everything just has this, this balance and this reciprocal way.”

That balance is returning. There’s been a rebound in the salmon population and the Yuroks also recently reintroduced the California condor — a scavenger that’s important to the ecosystem — back into the wild for the first time this century.

“It tells us that our land’s healing and that our people are gonna heal,” Clayburn said.

The Yuroks will take full control of ‘O Rew in 2026 and, in a first-of-its-kind partnership, receive help managing it from the Save the Redwoods League, California State Parks and The National Park Service.

“We understand some of the mistakes we made as a federal government, and it’s a chance to begin that healing with the native tribes all across the United States,” said National Park Service Director Chuck Sams.

For Sams, the first Native American to lead the agency, the partnership is personal.

“We’ve been writing our histories separately. There’s been the native history and then the American history. This is a chance when we’re doing co-stewardship and co-management to write history together,” he said.

Of the 431 parks managed by the National Park Service, 109 of them now have formal co-stewardship agreements with indigenous tribes, with 43 more on the way.

In addition to restoration work, plans for ‘O Rew include the creation of new trails, the construction of a traditional Yurok village and a state-of-the-art visitor center. The visitor center will display Yurok artifacts and highlight the tribe’s history and culture, with the goal of educating new visitors on the land’s history and significance from the perspective of those who have lived on it the longest.

“I really hope ‘O Rew symbolizes a coming home of the Yurok people and reconnecting with our landscape,” said Clayburn.

Truthsgiving

November 28, 2024 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

Happy Truthsgiving to you and yours! If that term is new to you, I refer you here, to a “debate” I had with Sean Sherman, known as the Lakota Chef, last year at this time, published in The Nation Magazine. I put “debate” in quotes, because — truthfully — Sean and I agree on many things. For instance, we both talk about how traditional Thanksgiving mythology fails to recognize the steep price paid by our people after colonizers came to our shores, the land that was stolen from us, and the variety of indispensable foods contributed by Indigenous cultures now enjoyed around Thanksgiving tables.

In my section, I expand on those thoughts by suggesting a rebrand of this deeply problematic holiday. Some in my community have called it “Thankstaking,” highlighting the many unwilling sacrifices Indigenous peoples have made over the centuries. Personally, I prefer Truthsgiving — which, while keeping with the traditional holiday spirit of sharing and gratitude, also calls for a necessary truthtelling component. And as a reminder to you: I invite you to stay in a space of gratitude and openness next week, when you’re invited to RSVP and join us online for our fourth annual Wopila Gathering, beginning at 4 p.m. PST on Giving Tuesday, Dec. 3.

Lakota LawPeople engage in a National Day of Mourning ceremony in front of a statue of Chief Massasoit, leader of the Wampanoag tribe, in Plymouth, Mass. on Thanksgiving Day in 2021. (Bryan R. Smith / Getty Images)

Between Truthsgiving and our Wopila Gathering, on Friday the U.S. also celebrates Native American Heritage Day, at the conclusion of National Native American Heritage Month. I’m grateful that each November is designated as a time to celebrate the history, culture, and achievements of Turtle Island’s Indigenous nations. If you’re Native, I hope you’re able to take some extra time to commune with your relatives and acknowledge your ancestors this weekend. And if you’re non-Native, I hope you’ll make room to appreciate all we have given.

And then, everyone, please attend the Wopila Gathering on Giving Tuesday. This annual event provides an excellent opportunity for us to gather around an even larger table to share stories, priorities, music, and all we have to give to one another. It’s going to be a wonderful couple hours of togetherness, generosity, and joy, so I hope you’ll bookmark this page, RSVP, and Zoom in with us for the festivities!

Wopila tanka — thank you for hearing us, and I hope to see you on Tuesday.
Chase Iron Eyes
Director and Lead Counsel
Lakota People’s Law Project
Sacred Defense Fund

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Lakota People’s Law Project
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From a Different Perspective

November 5, 2024November 5, 2024 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

This is a very informative video that puts our current situation into a historical perspective. Watch the video, research the information, and make plans to prepare to change what is happening.

Sugarcane: A New Documentary

September 20, 2024 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

This weekend, I had the opportunity to experience an incredible work of art. Because you’re with us in the ongoing effort to find healing for our people, I feel it’s important to share it with you, too. “Sugarcane” — an award-winning new documentary feature about the generational trauma Indigenous families and communities face as a result of the residential and boarding school era — is currently touring Indian Country and in limited theatrical release across Turtle Island. Acquired for distribution by National Geographic, it will soon stream on Disney+ and Hulu. Today, I urge you to watch the trailer, then make plans to see the full movie as soon as it’s available to you!

Watch the trailer: The film explores director Julian Brave NoiseCat’s fraught relationship with his father (pictured), who was born at a Canadian residential school.

By now, you’re no doubt all-too familiar with the horrors wrought at Indian residential and boarding schools — and the generational trauma that, as a result, affects virtually every person who grows up Indigenous in North America. Indeed, if you are Indigenous and didn’t go through it yourself, you 100% have relatives who experienced the forced assimilation, dehumanization, and cultural genocide of these institutions firsthand. If you’re non-Indigenous, you’ve probably read about it in more detail previously from us, in the news, or both.

“Sugarcane,” co-directed by Julian Brave NoiseCat (a member of the Canim Lake Band Tsq’escen and descendant of the Lil’Wat Nation of Mount Currie) and Emily Kassie, takes on this dynamic in a personal way. Its uncompromising lens includes NoiseCat’s exploration of his relationship with his father, who was born at a Canadian residential school. If the implications of that are not immediately obvious, I caution you to prepare yourself for some heavy material.

The New York Times called “Sugarcane” a “must-see film about a difficult subject.” I couldn’t agree more. Nonetheless, this is not a movie that overtly seeks to polemicize. It brings you in, sharing with the viewer an investigation, a personal quest, a struggle to understand and forgive what can be forgiven and expose what cannot.

I want to acknowledge in this space my real respect for NoiseCat, who in addition to directing this film and sharing his deeply personal story, is a decorated journalist. He also led the call — which Lakota Law, and by extension, supporters like you — joined to position Deb Haaland as the U.S.’s first Indigenous Cabinet secretary. That’s a strong example of what we can accomplish together when we watch and follow with action.

So I hope you will watch what NoiseCat, Kassie, and their team have created with “Sugarcane.” It’s beautiful. It’s tough. It’s important.

Wopila tanka — thank you for supporting Indigenous creators!
Tokata Iron Eyes
Spokesperson & Organizer
Lakota People’s Law Project

The Legacy of Crazy Horse

July 17, 2024 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

Today, I write to you to share a little piece of joy. Summer is an important time of year in Lakota Country. Right now, many from the Oceti Sakowin and beyond — including my father, Chase — are reconnecting in a deeply meaningful way with their spiritual identities at the annual Sun Dance ceremony.

And about a month ago, I also felt the power of reconnection with our ancestors, homelands, and tradition of horseback riding at this year’s Memorial Crazy Horse Ride. I invite you to watch our new video, which features footage from the days-long event, background on its meaning, and an interview with Oglala Lakota organizer Kylie Richards Red Willow, a junior political science major and pre-law student at the University of Colorado.

Watch: I interviewed organizer Kylie Red Willow about this year’s Memorial Crazy Horse Ride.

By now, you’re most likely aware of Crazy Horse and his enduring legacy. We recently wrote to you about the battles of the Rosebud and Greasy Grass (Little Big Horn), both of which were won in part thanks to this legendary Ogala Lakota war leader. The annual ride pays tribute to him, the role he played in those and many more confrontations with the U.S. Army, and also our other warriors, many of whom honorably served in the U.S. military over the decades.

Native People, of course, have a complicated and bloody history with the U.S. government, but that hasn’t stopped us from answering the call to serve in large numbers to protect this land, particularly when faced with existential threats like Hitler’s fascism during World War II. You may recall that, at that time, 29 Navajo code talkers in the Marine Corps provided a key to victory in the Pacific.

Today, of course, we still face fascist threats — some right here in our own homelands. Whether it’s the architects of Project 2025 seeking to reinstall Donald Trump as their presidential puppet, or S.D. Gov. Kristi Noem, who recently, offensively invoked the Sun Dance to falsely connect Native communities with Mexican drug cartels, we still have plenty of terrible people to fight.

As you know, we’ll take on those battles, and we won’t stop in the pursuit of justice and equality. When we pray to and ride for our ancestors, who fought so hard so we could be here today, we’re always reminded they expect nothing less.

Wopila tanka — my gratitude, always, for your friendship!
Tokata Iron Eyes
Spokesperson & Organizer
Lakota People’s Law Project

Native Sovereignty/ Indian Citizenship Act

June 7, 2024 / aztec8888 / Leave a comment

It has been a century since the imposition of American citizenship on Indigenous Nations marked a systemic threat to Tribal Nationhood and people. Since the signing of the Indian Citizenship Act on June 2, 1924, we’ve resisted the many waves of attempted erasure of Tribal sovereignty – legal and otherwise – designed to assimilate Indigenous identities into American citizenship.

Native Nations are not merely American citizens. The rights, privileges, and immunities granted by the U.S. Constitution are not the ultimate aspiration for Native people. Our treaties with the United States were made to uphold our status as sovereign nations, not subjects. Native people’s voluntary defense of the U.S. and its allies in World War I was used as a pretext to impose American citizenship, undermining Tribal sovereignty.

This week, we mark three of the many important anniversaries in our history: As Leonard Peltier nears 50 years in prison we demand his release by the June 10th parole board meeting. And we remember Leonard Crow Dog’s passing June 5, 2021, and the American Indian Movement (AIM) Mount Rushmore Action of June 6, 1971.

While it is good to pursue the rights that America considers inalienable, America will be lost unless it learns from the spiritual foundations of Native Nations and respects our sovereignty. We stand with all those who are willing to stand with Native Nations to defend our collective birthrights in these sacred lands and waters from the poison of corporations and government profiteering.

Free Leonard Peltier: No discussion of the American Indian Movement (AIM) can proceed without advocating for the release of Leonard Peltier, who has been illegally held captive as a political prisoner of the U.S.A. for nearly 50 years. Peltier is a victim of a corrupt FBI and anti-Indigenous Federal policies that caused numerous deaths and conflicts in the 1970s. Why have they not been held to account for this grave injustice? Why has no U.S. President or parole board, in 50 years, freed this man? Who are we if we live in a state of fear and terror of oppressive violent oligarchs?

Join us in calling for Leonard’s release by the Parole Board that meets on June 10th. It is imperative for restoring faith in justice and upholding human rights. Leonard deserves to spend his remaining years embraced by his community.

Remember Leonard Crow Dog: We honor the legacy of Chief of Chiefs Leonard Crow Dog, who passed on June 5, 2021. As a primary spiritual leader of the AIM, Crow Dog’s influence ensured the survival and pride of our traditional ways. His efforts helped establish a world of allies (Oceti Sakowin) and fortified the Native American Church. Crow Dog’s spiritual strength offers hope for humanity’s future against colonial violence.

Commemorating AIM’s Mount Rushmore Action: On June 6, 1971, AIM leaders, including Russell Means and Madonna Thunder Hawk, responded to Oglala Sioux elders’ call to assert Indigenous sovereignty over the sacred Black Hills. Guided by Leonard Crow Dog, they conducted a ceremony and climbed Mount Rushmore to reclaim their rights. Despite National Guard intervention and arrests, the charges were dismissed, culminating this powerful act of resistance and treaty defense.

In Solidarity, we express profound gratitude to all who stand with Indigenous sovereignty. Upholding Native sovereignty is essential to defending our collective rights to clean water, air, and a healthy climate. This is the Native way.

Wopila tanka — Thank you for your unwavering support.
Chase Iron Eyes
Director and Lead Counsel
The Lakota People’s Law Project