FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: October 24, 2024
Gila River Indian Community– In response to news that tomorrow President Biden plans to make a historic apology to Indigenous Peoples for the boarding school system developed and operated by the federal government for nearly 200 years and designed to strip Indigenous children and future generations of their families, cultures, identities, and languages, NDN Collective released the following statement:
“While Biden’s apology is significant because it marks the first time the federal government has formally acknowledged their role in the generations of harm caused by abusive and deadly mandatory residential schools, the president’s words ring hollow without action.
“The pain caused by residential schools is immeasurable – all Indigenous Peoples of the U.S. and Canada are survivors of that brutal system, as it was used to collectively strip us of our languages, cultures, strong family structures, and community wellbeing. We all continue to navigate the residual impacts of such an aggressive assault on our Nations and lifeways.
“Apologies must include meaningful action to repair the harm done – otherwise, they are just manipulative tools giving the semblance of care to distract from continued wrongdoing. Biden can and should make his apology real by:
- Passing the U.S. Truth & Healing Commission Bill to ensure continued funding and support for the relatives who survived boarding schools;
- Granting immediate Executive Clemency for boarding school survivor Leonard Peltier, freeing him from his 50 year incarceration;
- Immediately investing in Indigenous language and cultural revitalization programs;
- Rescinding all medals of honor awarded to US soldiers for the massacre at Wounded Knee, in which 300 unarmed Lakota people – mostly women and children – were slaughtered;
- Instructing the Bureau of Indian Education to conduct a full-scale investigation into failure by the Tuba City Boarding School system to address egregious misconduct and support the nationwide reforms being demanded by parents and students to keep children safe at BIE run schools.
“We make these demands alongside and in honor of boarding school survivors, and in memory of the nearly 1,000 children who we know died at the schools as well as the thousands more unaccounted for that we will never forget.”
NDN Collective to Hold Emergent Virtual & In-Person Press Conference
NDN Collective is headquartered in Rapid City, South Dakota, a place marked by a painful history of a cruel and negligent boarding school that operated from 1898-1933. NDN Collective will hold a press conference tomorrow, Friday October 25 at 12pm MT at NDN Collective’s headquarters. The press conference will be live streamed via Zoom and members of the press will have the opportunity to ask questions in the chat.
Speakers will include a boarding school survivor, as well as representatives from NDN Collective, and Remembering the Children.
To RSVP for the press conference and receive livestream login information, please contact press@ndncollective.org.
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NDN Collective is an Indigenous-led organization dedicated to building Indigenous power. Through organizing, activism, philanthropy, grantmaking, capacity-building, and narrative change, we are creating sustainable solutions on Indigenous terms.