Walter Echo-Hawk is one of the foremost experts in Indian law and is a distinguished author, tribal judge, law professor, and member of the Pawnee Nation. Echo-Hawk presented, “Challenges for Federal Indian Law Practitioners in the Decade Ahead”, to a full crowd in the UND School of Law VandeWalle Courtrom on Wednesday, April 17, 2024. He is the past President of the Pawnee Nation Business Council (2020-2023), an author, attorney, jurist, and legal scholar. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 2023. He is the author of The Sea of Grass (2018); In The Light Of Justi ..read more

Haley Omeasoo is working to create the first DNA database of Blackfeet Nation members Photo by: Ryan Brennecke/ University of Montana Haley Omeasoo, a Ph.D. student studying DNA tracing to find the identities of missing and murdered Ingenious people, poses for a portrait at the University of Montana on April 3, 2024. By: Mark Roth – UM News Service Posted at 5:21 PM, Apr 06, 2024 MISSOULA — Haley Omeasoo was already studying forensic science at the University of Montana when she saw the poster that redefined her life. The 2017 poster announced that her former high school classmate ..read more

Oct 17, 2023 | 5:00 am ET By Alex Brown Across the roughly 1,300 square miles of the White Earth Indian Reservation in northwest Minnesota, tribal members harvest wild rice in waters that have sustained them for generations. They’ve been working for decades to restore sturgeon, a culturally important fish, and they harvest minnows and leeches to supply bait for anglers across the country. But the White Earth Band can no longer depend on the clean, abundant waters that make those activities possible. Droughts brought on by climate change and irrigation for agriculture have threatened the ..read more

Orange Shirt Day is a national remembrance of the Indigenous children who died and suffered at residential boarding schools during the 19th and 20th centuries. By Maeve Hushman October 03, 2023 at 1:00 PM GRAND FORKS — Countless Indigenous children died after being forcibly sent to residential boarding schools in the United States and Canada in the 19th and 20th centuries, but even the ones who survived endured lasting trauma. “I’ve seen the impact on other people’s families.” said Mishaye Belgarde, secretary of the UND Native American Law Student Association. “The scars are still fresh ..read more

The economic impact of SCOTUS upholding the Indian Child Welfare Act Marketplace Savannah Maher Listen Indian Country breathed a sigh of relief on Thursday morning when the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Indian Child Welfare Act, or ICWA. That 1978 federal law gives tribal nations a voice in custody proceedings involving Native children and aims to keep them connected to their families and communities. “It’s a good day in Indian Country and it’s a good day for the rule of law,” said Dan Lewerenz, a professor at the University of North Dakota School of Law and a former attorney with th ..read more

After fighting to win back her parental rights, a young Native American mother prevailed. Then the state came for her second child. Cheyenne Hinojosa with her younger daughter, who was taken by child welfare workers shortly after being born ProPublica by Jessica Lussenhop and Agnel Philip, photography by Jaida Grey Eagle for ProPublicaJune 15, 6 a.m. EDT ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up for Dispatches, a newsletter that spotlights wrongdoing around the country, to receive our stories in your inbox every week. U ..read more

The fate of the Indian Child Welfare Act When it comes to children, should tribes govern themselves? DeseretNews By Mya Jaradat May 16, 2023, 12:16pm CDT Not long after Jennifer and Chad Brackeen felt called by God to become foster parents, they got a call of another kind: this one from Texas’s Child Protective Services, saying they had a baby boy — known in legal documents as A.L.M. — who needed a home. Because A.L.M.’s mother was a member of the Navajo Nation, the caseworker warned the Brackeens, who are white, that the child would only be with them for a few months while the ..read more

Via AP news wire Tuesday 07 February 2023 A handful of U.S. states are considering legislation this year to include provisions of the Indian Child Welfare Act in state law as the U.S. Supreme Court considers whether the federal law is constitutional. At least 10 states already have done so. The act requires states to notify Native American tribes when children who are enrolled or could be enrolled in a federally recognized tribe are removed from their families due to allegations of abuse or neglect; to seek placement with the child’s extended family, members of the child’s tribe or ..read more

Northern Arizona University’s Native American Cultural Center and the Institute for Tribal Environmental Professionals invited Professor Grijalva to Flagstaff, Arizona for one of their many events for Native American month. Professor Grijalva discussed several regional examples of environmental injustice affecting indigenous peoples: allocation of shrinking Colorado River water without consideration of senior Indian tribal water rights; the continuing health risks from uranium mining waste left on the Navajo and Hopi Reservations in the 1950s; the use of treated human sewage effluent to make s ..read more

A five-year battle over a bag of clams shows how a reliance on century-old treaties can lead authorities to treat members of some tribes differently than others. by Ashley Braun Hakai Magazine | November 10, 2022 It was April 30, 2017, and Michael and Andrew Simmons were walking down Copalis Beach, along Washington’s southwest coast, when they were stopped by Cory Branscomb, an officer with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW). The Simmonses were carrying bulging blue bags, and Branscomb, acting on a tip, wanted to know about their haul. In Washington, a recreational shellf ..read more