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“I don’t know whose “ancestors” Donald Trump was referring to when he said that they “tamed a continent,” but certainly not mine—nor those of the other hundreds of millions of Americans whose ancestry is not European (pdf).
On Friday at a Naval Academy commencement address, your president gleefully proclaimed that “our ancestors tamed a continent,” adding that “we are not going to apologize for America,” because why would a decent human being apologize for genocide or refrain from calling human beings savages (i.e., those who need to be “tamed”)?
“Together there is nothing Americans can’t do, absolutely nothing,” Trump told the more than 1,000 graduates. “In recent years, and even decades, too many people have forgotten that truth. They’ve forgotten that our ancestors trounced an empire, tamed a continent and triumphed over the worst evils in history.”
He added: “America is the greatest fighting force for peace, justice and freedom in the history of the world. We have become a lot stronger lately. We are not going to apologize for America. We are going to stand up for America.”
As Newsweek reports, Native Americans occupied the land “discovered” by Europeans but were forced to relinquish territory through traditional and biological warfare as “new Americans” pushed westward as part of what was termed “manifest destiny.” In 1830, President Andrew Jackson signed the Indian Removal Act, which led to the deaths of thousands of Native Americans.”
– The Root, Trump to Naval Academy Grads: ‘Our Ancestors Tamed a Continent’.
“And in the short time Trump has been in office, the National Congress of American Indians has twice found itself having to issue public rebukes of the president for his racially charged mocking of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), whom Trump calls “Pocahontas.” One episode took place as World War II veterans of Navajo ancestry were being honored at the White House. Behind them was a giant portrait of former President Andrew Jackson, seen as one of history’s most brutal oppressors of Native Americans.
Trump’s relationship with Native Americans was tense long before he arrived at the White House. Testifying before Congress in 1993, he accused Native American competitors of fabricating their ancestry and serving as a front for the mafia. He offered no evidence. “They don’t look like Indians to me,” he said of Native Americans competing against his troubled Atlantic City casinos.
Yet not all tribes are at odds with this administration. For those that have built their economies around fossil fuel industries, Trump’s push to roll back regulations is welcome. The administration is working with tribal leaders trying to keep open the hulking Navajo Generating Station coal plant near Page, Ariz., and it wants to lift a myriad of environmental and workplace rules that add to the cost of mining and drilling.”
– LA Times, The Trump agenda has Native American tribes feeling under siege.
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Indian Country 52
Indian Country 52 is a weekly project by David Bernie that uses the medium of posters that promote issues and stories in Indian Country.
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