Monday, November 4, 2024

National Native News

Photo: Montana’s Tim Sheehy, left, and incumbent Sen. Jon Tester faced off in a debate on Montana PBS. (Courtesy Montana PBS)

Control of the U.S. Senate could hinge on the Montana Senate race and Native Americans could very well decide the outcome after racist Indian tropes became a centerpiece of the contest.

Matt Laslo reports from Washington.

Most polls have three-term U.S. Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) behind his Republican challenger Tim Sheehy, but Sen. Tester’s campaign has been redoubling its get-out-the-vote effort including on the state’s reservations where many of Montana’s estimated 70,000 Native Americans live.

That makes them a crucial voting block, and many are mad after recordings surfaced of Sheehy mocking attendees of Montana’s 105-year-old Crow Fair celebration, saying “they’re drunk at 8 a.m.” and throw beer cans during the parade.

Tribal elders have called on the former Navy SEAL to apologize but he’s refused, which the moderator relayed to Sheehy in their September debate.

Sheehy responded: “The reality is, yeah, [it was] insensitive. I come from the military, as many of our tribal members do. We make insensitive jokes and probably off-color sometimes, but I’m an adult, I’ll take responsibility for that. But let’s not distract from the issues that our tribal communities are hurting.”

Sen. Tester called on Sheehy to apologize.

“You can say, ‘Look, I’ll take responsibility,’ but apologies matter. And how you treat people matters, and if you treat them with disrespect, other people will disrespect them. So, like I said to begin with, you’re a big guy; just apologize.”

When National Native News asked Interior Secretary Deb Haaland (Laguna Pueblo) — the first Native American cabinet secretary in history — about demeaning tropes being spread by political aspirants like Sheehy in this election, she said it’s time for candidates to read up on Native American history.

“All I can say is that I hope that people who say things like that will educate themselves, because if they’re running for office, they need to be educated so that they can be effective leaders for their constituents. I know that there will always be a certain amount of ignorance out there with respect to tribal nations.”

Sec. Haaland told us Sheehy’s comments are personally painful.

“When people say really offensive things like that, they lack a knowledge of the history of our people. Our history is complicated. It’s complex. It has many different eras. We went through eras of genocide, and we went through eras of land stealing and then assimilation policies. We have lived through so much.”

In their official capacity, federal officials like Sec. Haaland are prohibited from campaigning by the Hatch Act, so we never mentioned Sheehy by name to the Interior secretary.

And when we specifically asked about the incumbent senator, the secretary gently rebuffed us.

“I can’t ask you about politics, but what has Sen. Tester — as a former chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee — what has he meant to Indian Country?”

“Would you like to ask a different question? Because I can’t speak for him.”

Sen. Tester’s campaign is dropping more than $1 million on tribal outreach this year, and they’re hoping Indian Country comes through and sends him back to Washington on Tuesday.

(Courtesy Erin Braaten / Dancing Aspens Photography)

A rare white bison calf was born in Yellowstone National Park last summer.

Now, a resolution to protect such animals has strong support from tribal communities.

The Mountain West News Bureau’s Hanna Merzbach tells us why.

Phil White Eagle is Sicangu Lakota.

He believes the white bison calf – even rarer because it has a black nose and eyes – fulfilled a tribal prophecy.

It could be both a blessing and an opportunity to reflect on our relationship with nature.

“We need to get ready for something that’s coming…it means that we need to pray.”

And Two Eagle believes more white animals could be born around the world.

So, tribes and conservation leaders have banded together to get the animals recognized as sacred internationally.

A resolution at the United Nations biodiversity conference could do that in the coming years.

“The white animal is a messenger of some type.”

A Lakota spiritual leader has dubbed the Yellowstone bison Wakan Gli – which means Return Sacred.

And on this day in 1791, a coalition of Great Lakes tribes crushed U.S. troops at the Wabash River in western Ohio.

Miami Chief Little Turtle

Lead by Miami Chief Little Turtle and Shawnee Chief Blue Jacket, the Native warriors advanced in a crescent formation against the troops, killing 600 in three hours and causing the rest to flee in panic.

Deaths on the Native side were estimated to be as few as a couple dozen.

It’s considered the biggest victory of Native Americans against U.S. soldiers, more so than the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876.

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