National Native News

A public records request in a Missing Indigenous Persons case in North Dakota has revealed unusual footage. As reported this week in Buffalo’s Fire, 77 hours of surveillance footage from the Mandan Police Department shows 20-year-old Renzo Bullhead (Standing Rock Sioux) approaching a railroad bridge, headed east towards Bismarck, N.D. on March 16. But in footage not previously seen by the public,...

The Miccosukee Tribe is embarking on a campaign to buy and protect lands in the Florida Everglades. The Guardian reports that it is in a partnership with the Florida Wildlife Corridor Foundation. The goal is to create a safe habitat for threatened species including black bears, panthers, and Key deer. The initiative was spurred by the Trump administration’s slashing of federal funds for conservati...

The Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribes recently received grants from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. But as Wyoming Public Radio’s Hannah Habermann reports, other housing-related funding for the tribes is a little less certain. Tribes around the country receive federal support through the annual Indian Housing Block Grant. This year, the Eastern Shoshone Tribe got a...

Writer, actress, comedienne, and activist Jana Schmieding is known for her work with Native-themed series such as Rutherford Falls and Reservation Dogs , but she’s also a “Duck”. The University of Oregon alum is this year’s commencement speaker and spent this weekend reconnecting with her campus community. Schmieding graduated in 2005 with a degree in Theater Arts. On Saturday, she and her family...

The U.S. Congress is considering a rescission request from the Trump administration to pull funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). As SDPB’s Lee Strubinger reports, the maneuver would negatively affect many tribal radio stations, including four in South Dakota. The station KOYA stands to lose about $200,000 if congress ultimately approves the rescission. John Miller is the stat...

Native American tribes are advising members to carry paper documentation as they travel, to avoid getting caught up in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids. Since President Donald Trump’s push to arrest and deport undocumented immigrants began with his second term, reports of Native people being confronted about their citizenship status by ICE agents have been happening all across...

Last Friday, a federal judge in Phoenix denied a pair of motions seeking preliminary injunction to stop the Oak Flat land swap between the U.S. Forest Service and the multinational mining company Resolution Copper. KJZZ’s Gabriel Pietrorazio has details. Federal Judge Dominic Lanza considered their pleas “premature” amid a nearly two-hour hearing at the Sandra Day O’Connor Courthouse. In fact, Lan...

In Montana, the FBI and Crow Tribe are working together to offer $10,000 for information in the disappearance of Sa’wade Birdinground, a teenage girl who’s been missing from the Crow reservation for eight months. YPR’s Jackie Coffin has more from Crow Agency. For its third consecutive year, the FBI has surged resources to its bureaus that serve Indian Country as part of Operation Not Forgotten, an...

The New York State Education Department has rejected the Trump administration’s demand that a ban on Native American mascots be reversed, challenging the federal government’s interpretation of civil rights law. The New York Times reports that President Donald Trump recently accused New York of illegal discrimination, condemning a state requirement that strips funding from school districts that app...

(Photo: Gabriel Pietrorazio / KJZZ) Oak Flat is set to become one of the biggest copper mines in the world following a U.S. Supreme Court decision not to hear the case last month, but the Apache people who consider it to be a sacred site are still fighting to protect it. More than a dozen opponents to the project will appear at the Phoenix federal courthouse Friday where the Harvard-educated, Trum...

Photo: The Old San Carlos Memorial is located in Peridot on the San Carlos Apache Reservation. (Gabriel Pietrorazio / KJZZ) Nestled within the Tonto National Forest in Arizona is Oak Flat – home to one of the largest undeveloped copper deposits on Earth. The ore could be worth a fortune to the mining companies planning to extract it, but to many Apache people, Oak Flat’s value can’t be measured in...

Photo courtesy Oglala Lakota College Pell Grants send thousands of lower-income students to college each year across the country. However, proposed changes could lower that number drastically, often in the communities that need it most like tribes. South Dakota Public Broadcasting’s C.J. Keene has more. Proposed Trump administration changes could slash Pell Grant funding by as much as a quarter. I...

The Coquille Indian Tribe and the Oregon Department of Veterans’ Affairs recently signed an agreement. The agreement creates a framework for collaboration and increased resources to support Native veterans in accessing federal and state veterans’ benefits. According to a press release, the Memorandum of Understanding paves the way for the establishment of the tribe’s first Tribal Veterans Se...

Photo: Courtesy Milk River Meats & Eats / Facebook Montana’s Department of Commerce recently awarded over $300,000 in grants to Native-owned businesses across the state. The funds aim to support the economic development of tribal communities while supporting small businesses. Montana Public Radio’s Victoria Traxler has more. George Brown of Dodson and member of the Little Shell Chippewa tribe...

Photo: Ayuq Blanchett and Josaia Lehauli receive awards from the Tlingit Culture Language and Literacy program at Harborview Elementary School on Monday, Feb. 6, 2023. (Clarise Larson / KTOO) In Alaska, the Juneau School District is expanding its support of a local language immersion program. After multiple meetings and extended debate, the school board has agreed to fund more of the Lingít langu...

Photo: The perch at North Slope Borough’s bowhead whale census, April 16, 2019. (Ravenna Koenig / Alaska’s Energy Desk) Scientists and Alaska hunters have been counting bowhead whales passing by the northernmost American town, Utqiagvik, for the past two months. It is part of a once-in-a-decade effort to evaluate the health of the whale population up north – and support subsistence in the area. Th...

A group of tribes want the U.S. government to explain how it historically funded boarding schools for Indigenous children. As Jimmy Romo reports for the Mountain West News Bureau, the tribes recently filed a lawsuit aiming to force the country to reckon with the past. The Wichita and Affiliated Tribes of Oklahoma, along with the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California, filed the lawsuit in a Pennsyl...

(Photo: Hannah Habermann / Wyoming Public Media) Colorado is joining the Eastern Shoshone Tribe in Wyoming in designating bison as wildlife. Wyoming Public Radio’s Olivia Weitz reports. Earlier this year, the Eastern Shoshone Tribe reclassified bison from being livestock to wildlife in an effort to manage the species less like cattle and more like big game. On Thursday, Colorado’s governor signed...

Photo: Navajo Code Talkers gather in Church Rock, N.M. in 2010. (Antonia Gonzales) Today is Memorial Day, and across the U.S., parades, ceremonies, and similar events are being held to honor those who served and died for their country. That includes an observance from a Missing and Murdered Indigenous People (MMIP) activist in Oregon. Kimberly Lining is the founder of MMIW Search and Hope Alliance...

Photo: Bison from the city of Denver’s herds are in a pen waiting to be loaded onto a trailer. This year, the city donated 23 bison to tribes. (Courtesy Denver Parks and Recreation) Bison are being restored to tribal lands across the Mountain West and the Great Plains. As the Mountain West News Bureau’s Rachel Cohen reports, a herd managed in Colorado is playing a big role. A few bison jumpe...

May is Missing and Murdered Indigenous People (MMIP) Awareness Month, where community groups, tribal leaders, and advocates highlight the disproportionate levels of violence directed at Native people. Among the events held this month was the fifth annual Poetry in the Park event in Springfield, Oreg., which was sponsored by Illioo Theater, the University of Oregon’s Native American and Indigenous...

A long-standing argument over funding for law enforcement on northwest Montana’s Flathead Reservation is over – for now. Montana Public Radio’s Aaron Bolton reports Gov. Greg Gianforte (R-MT) has signed off on funding to help county and tribal officials hash out a long-term plan. For years, Lake County and Gov. Gianforte have sparred over who’s financially responsible for prosecuting tribal member...

Tribal leaders from across the country spoke out last week at a U.S. Senate hearing against recent changes within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Others are eyeing how potential cuts to the department’s Indian Health Service (IHS) could affect Native communities. The Alaska Desk reporter Alena Naiden from our flagship station KNBA has more. HHS announced in March that it would c...

Montana’s Native families face higher rates of separation with a disproportionate number of Native kids in foster care. A nonprofit in Lodge Grass is developing a center aimed at keeping tribal families together and out of social services. MTPR’s Victoria Traxler has more. Mountain Shadow Association recently began construction of a family healing center to support communities on the Crow Reservat...

Acclaimed Indigenous chef Sean Sherman is expanding his nonprofit to Montana. Yellowstone Public Radio’s Ruth Eddy has more about his plans in Bozeman. “So we’ve got ground elk, onions, delicata squash. We just chopped it up real fine. It’s got sumac, cedar, and salt in it “  Chef Rob Kinneen with the nonprofit Indigenous Food Lab is grilling at the kitchen of Fork and Spoon in Bozeman. The...