Protesters occupy BIA in Washington

WASHINGTON—On Thursday, October 14, Native American activists occupied the lobby of the Stuart Udall Main Interior Building, focusing on the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and citing grave concerns over United States environmental policy. After four hours, 55 were arrested and the building was cleared. According to the Interior Department several officers were injured, one taken to the hospital, and an unspecified number of protesters were tased attempting to hold open the building doors to allow more protesters to enter. Overall, since Native American Day on Monday, October 11, over 500 environmental protesters have been arrested in the capitol area, many of them non-Native, all part of a concerted “People v Fossil Fuels” activist coalition

If Native protesters expected a less physical and immediate response from the Interior Department, given Deb Haaland, an enrolled member of the Laguna Pueblo is Secretary of the Interior, this did not happen,

“Interior Department leadership believes strongly in respecting and upholding the right to free speech and peaceful protest,” Interior Department spokesperson Melissa Schwartz said. “It is also our obligation to keep everyone safe. We will continue to do everything we can to de-escalate the situation while honoring First Amendment rights.”

Cabinet secretaries serve at the pleasure of the sitting president and traditionally have not charted independent policy or actions. Haaland’s response to the lobby occupation reflected this historic reality.

“We filed in, locked arms in a circle to occupy space (in the lobby) in hopes that we could speak with Deb (Haaland),” protester Annie Baker said. “From there, we were met with the violence of the police, who mostly sought out Indigenous elders and Indigenous women to arrest them first. And they arrested media very violently. I mean, like body slammed, ripping cameras off …”

Although environmental protests have been going on all week, all of them expressing concern over President Biden’s environmental policy, the Interior Department said that Secretary Haaland was out of town.

People v Fossil Fuels underlined their concerns with the Biden Administration in a press release: “…the Biden Administration has approved a record number of new oil and gas leases on public lands, refused to stop major new fossil fuel projects like the Line 3 pipeline, and been slow to crack down on existing pollution.  Meanwhile, new analysis from Oil Change International shows that if the Biden Administration moves ahead with 21 major fossil fuel infrastructure projects that are currently under federal review, it would be the emissions equivalent of adding 316 new coal fired power plants — more than are currently operating in the United States. The total emissions from just these projects would represent 17 percent of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2019.”

President Biden has called the climate crisis a “code red” emergency, but he did not acknowledge the protests, meet with the protestors, or address any of their demands or allegations.

Conservative media like the Daily Caller, the Washington Examiner and the Red State website, chose to limit mention of Native participation in the BIA occupation, and focus on the protesters as violent insurrectionists vandalizing public property. Even the Washington Post chose to participate in this media spin with the headline “Police and climate activists hurt in clashes at Interior Dept.”

Back in 1972 hundreds of American Indian Movement (AIM) activists forcibly occupied the BIA lobby, breaking up furniture to bar exits, and escorting security personnel from the building. The stand-off with the Nixon Administration went on for six days and ended with a paper bag containing over $60,000 in cash being left on the building’s front steps. These protesters, called militants by the media, had a detailed 20-point manifesto, and after a half century only one of the demands was ever addressed, and that was the Religious Freedom Act of 1978. Concerns over climate were not in this manifesto because although people were expressing alarm about climate degradation it was not a mainstream topic of concern in 1972. AIM’s main focus was on the demands for treaty rights and a more equitable relationship with the federal government. The media reported it as such, and the occupation was big news in every media outlet across the planet.

While the demands and concerns of Native protesters were marginalized by the mainstream media, or mispresented by conservative media as a “violent insurrection,” (to offset liberal alarm about the January 6 insurrection, the nature of Native involvement was summed up by Jennifer Falcon, with Indigenous Rising Media: “I feel devastated as an Indigenous woman, I just lost my grandmother to cancer, from a mine that poisoned water, two months ago. I should be at home mourning and I’m here.”

It remains to be seen if the Biden Administration will officially address the issues raised by the environmental protesters or if Secretary Holland will officially address the same concerns,

 

(Contact James Giago Davies at skindiesel@msn.com)

The post Protesters occupy BIA in Washington first appeared on Native Sun News Today.

Visit Original Source