On sovereign Lakota land, Day One Movement calls for a new beginning

CAMP MNI LUZAHAN, S.D. — On sovereign Lakota land in the Black Hills, Black and Indigenous organizers launched the Day One movement this week, calling for a “new beginning” for the United States just days before the 250th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence.

Gathered at Camp Mni Luzahan in the He Sapa, movement leaders framed the buildup to July 4, 2026—promoted nationally as “250 years of freedom”— as a moment to face the country’s violent beginnings and to plan a future built on land back, reparations, and self-determination.

“July 5, 2026, represents a new opportunity to build a country that works for all of us,” said Erinn Carter, an educator and Day One movement organizer from the West Coast of the United States, who opened the press conference. “The truth is that America is stolen land, and the truth is that America was built with stolen hands.”

Day One describes itself as a national movement rooted in Black and Indigenous communities across the U.S. and Pacific Islands. Organizers say it directly challenges the whitewashing of genocide, slavery, and land theft, and responds to a wave of “250th propaganda” celebrating liberty while rights for marginalized communities are under attack.

Nick Tilson, a Lakota father, husband and community organizer speaking on his homelands in the He Sapa, told reporters he was not speaking on behalf of any organization but as an individual in a grassroots movement made up of “people across this country and across this nation.”

“We cannot continue to perpetuate anti Blackness, we cannot continue to perpetuate Indigenous erasure if we’re going to build a path forward,” Tilson said, describing land return to Indigenous peoples and Black reparations as core to the vision.

At Camp Mni Luzahan, organizers also unveiled a “Bill of Essential Rights,” a modern framework they say exposes the limits and unequal application of the existing U.S. Bill of Rights.

The document was presented by Jacy Bowles, a longtime resident of Oakland, California, who described herself as a child of Native Mexican and settler parents and an urban climate justice activist and community organizer.

The Day One Bill of Essential Rights includes:
• Right to land back
• Right to reparations
• Right to self-determination and sovereignty
• Right to consent
• Right to basic needs
• Right to religion and culture
• Right to dignity and bodily autonomy Right to safety
• Right to move freely and belong
• Right to regenerative food systems and a protected planet

Bowles said generations of experience show the current system “allows for vastly unequal interpretation and application” of rights, and argued the new framework is needed to ensure “all humans and Mother Earth” have the rights and dignity they deserve.

Speakers stressed that Black–Indigenous solidarity is longstanding, rooted in generations of shared resistance.

“The past 250 years of genocide of enslavement, of empire and lies—is up,” said Fae, a Day One organizer based in Washington, D.C., introduced as a community organizer and direct action practitioner. “America is stolen lands built by stolen hands, stolen bodies, stolen livelihoods, stolen wealth. There would be no 250 without Black labor.”

Fae and other speakers linked Day One to Maroon communities – self-governing settlements formed by Black people who escaped slavery – and to historic alliances between free Black settlements and Indigenous nations in places like Louisiana, the Carolinas and Florida, arguing that renewed Black– Indigenous solidarity today is what most threatens systems of white supremacy.” She said there are examples throughout history of these alliances. “And so, what we’re asking for folks really to do is lean back into the practices that are actually culturally significant to us and already exist in the same ways that have already been named, because that is actually their biggest fear. We have an opportunity right now, July 5. This is our next 250 years. We decide every moment past then what that looks like, we decide how we interact with one another, we decide how we care for each other, we decide how people meet their needs, and we as a movement are committed to a different 250 than the last 250 and so for folks at home who are wondering, what does it look like July 5? What do I do? Go into your community, build those relationships, free each other by being outside, being open, being vulnerable, being willing to learn, and finding out what sovereignty and liberation looks like for yourself and for each other, because this is a communal process. We can only do this with all of us. We need everyone. When we see each other’s struggles as one… that is when we are the majority, and when we’re the majority, anything is possible,” Fae said.

The Camp Mni Luzahan launch is just one part of a broader cultural project. In the coming days, Day One organizers from the Midwest to the Northeast, Southwest, Mid Atlantic, and Southeast will engage in creative actions to counter the “lies surrounding the Fourth of July as a day of freedom and liberty.” These creative actions will ask people to face the historical and ongoing violence against Black and Indigenous people by the U.S government

“Day One is a necessary response to the rise in authoritarianism, and the beautiful result of oppressed peoples banding together to create a world where we can all flourish,” Tilson said in the movement’s materials. “We are here to say no more broken Treaties, no more modern-day enslavement, and no more destroying our Mother Earth.”

“We were all born with inherent freedom and intrinsic worth,” added Fae. “Now is the time to pour into our artists, our visionaries, and rising leaders.”

Speakers tied the movement’s demands to concrete struggles— housing, health care, wages, and schools.

Brenda Pérez, an immigrant labor rights activist from Nashville, Tennessee, told the crowd she is an immigrant from northern Mexico who has lived in the United States for 25 years as an undocumented person and DACA holder, and the daughter of a domestic worker who cleaned “toilets of the rich and powerful” to raise her family.

“We are here to say that we are going to organize, we are going to heal, we’re going to coordinate, and we’re going to build a better future together,” Pérez said, envisioning rural hospitals, health care that is not a luxury, fully funded teachers, dignified work, and real land back and reparations. “If you have felt a struggle… this movement is for you.”

Asked about national politics and July 4 festivities, Tilson said Day One is focused on the long arc, not a single holiday or presidency.

“This movement is not concerned with Trump or July 3 or July 4,” he said. “This movement is concerned about July 5 and the next 250 years… Trump comes and goes, but we’ll still be here.”

For Day One organizers, that long view rests on a simple claim: despite centuries of violence, Black and Indigenous peoples remain.

As the press conference came to a close Tilson asked, “Is it possible that the best days of our people are actually in front of us and not behind us? And if that is true to you, what action does that invoke today?”

More information about the Day One movement, including the full Bill of Essential Rights and upcoming actions, is available at dayonemovement.org.

(Contact Marnie Cook at cookm8715@gmail.com)

The post On sovereign Lakota land, Day One Movement calls for a new beginning first appeared on Native Sun News Today.

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