My new book, “The Ghost Road: Anishinaabe Responses to Indian-Hating,” will be published in October 2020 by Fulcrum Publishing. You can pre-order. Here is a Media Kit PDF.
“The Ghost Road” Promotional Materials
Month: September 2020
Mark Trahant (ICT) on Native Lawyers Who Should Be Considered for SCOTUS
Here is “The most important thing a president can do.”
An excerpt:
Yet there have always been Native American lawyers who could have served; the talent has always been there. It’s possible the next round of appointments could make history because so many Native American lawyers have the same or better legal experience than other appointments to the courts.
“Even over the past few years we have always had really great well qualified attorneys,” said Joel West Williams, Cherokee Nation, a senior attorney with Native American Rights Fund in Washington. “The biggest thing that has changed is they have worked their way into positions such as state supreme court justice — and that is a prime position from which to be selected.”
There are three Native Americans actively serving in the federal courts. President Barack Obama appointed U.S. District Judge Diane Humetewa, Hopi, in Arizona, and U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson, Native Hawaiian, in Hawaii. President Trump appointed U.S. District Judge Ada Elene Brown, Choctaw, in the Northern District of Texas.
There are three Native Americans now serving on state supreme courts, Justice Rachel Montoya-Lewis, Isleta Pueblo, in Washington, Ann McKeig, White Earth, and in Oklahoma, Dustin Rowe, Chickasaw.
Ten Percent of Mississippi Choctaw Citizens Served by the Tribe Have Contracted COVID
Here is “More Choctaws Have Died of COVID Than Those Who Died of the Disease in Hawaii. Or Alaska. Or Wyoming” from the Pulitzer Center.
Ak-Chin Indian Community Water Rights Claim to Proceed
Here are the materials so far in Ak-Chin Indian Community v. Maricopa-Stanfield Irrigation & Drainage District (D. Ariz.):
2020-05-08 – Dkt 011 – Maricopa-Stanfield_s Motion to Dismiss
2020-05-08 – Dkt 012 – Central Arizona Irrigation Motion to Dismiss
2020-05-29 – Dkt 017 – Plt_s Consolidated Response in Opposition to Defs_ Motions to Dismiss
2020-06-15 – Dkt 021 – Reply ISO Maricopa-Stanfield Irr & Drainage District_s Motion to Dismiss
2020-06-15 – Dkt 022 – CA Irr & Drainage District_s Reply ISO Motion to Dismiss
The complaint is here.
Ninth Circuit Decides Southcentral Foundation v. Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium
Here is the opinion, holding the Southcentral Foundation has standing to sue over the provision of heath care services.
Briefs here.
Bridge Magazine: “In Michigan, rising lake levels disturb sacred ground”
Here.
Navajo Man Loses Federal Criminal Sentencing Disparity Claim in Tenth Circuit
Jamestown S’Klallam Loses Indian Health Services Funding Claim
Here are the materials in Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe v. Azar (D.D.C.):
Warigia Bowman on COVID, Coal, and the Navajo Nation
Warigia M. Bowman has posted “Dikos Nitsaa’igii-19 (The Big Cough): Coal, COVID, and the Navajo Nation” on SSRN.
Here is the abstract:
This essay makes the following arguments. First, the US federal government knows how to electrify remote rural areas, and has in fact electrified rural areas as remote and inaccessible as the Appalachian Mountains. Yet, the US government has failed to electrify Navajo. Second, Navajo Nation is surrounded by power plants which send electricity to Phoenix, Los Angeles, and parts distant, yet transmission lines and infrastructure have not been properly extended from those power plants to inside of Navajo Nation. Third, the health risks of residential coal burning are well known, and given the health risks of COVID-19 and the fact that underlying respiratory conditions make the Navajo quite susceptible to this disease, the need to address this infrastructure gap is urgent.
Robison on Tribal-Federal Cooperative Management of the Grand Canyon
Jason Robison has posted “Indigenizing Grand Canyon,” forthcoming in the Utah Law Review, on SSRN.
Here is the abstract:
The magical place commonly called the “Grand Canyon” is Native space. Eleven tribes hold traditional connections to the canyon according to the National Park Service. This Article is about relationships between these tribes and the agency—past, present, and future. Grand Canyon National Park’s 2019 centennial afforded a valuable opportunity to reflect on these relationships and to envision what they might become. A reconception of the relationships has begun in recent decades that reflects a shift across the National Park System as a whole. This reconception should continue. Drawing on the tribal vision for Bears Ears National Monument, this Article advocates for Grand Canyon tribes and the Park Service to consider forming a Grand Canyon Commission for cooperative management of Grand Canyon National Park. Establishing this Commission would mark the vanguard of the relational reconception, and, in this precise sense, the Commission would lay a foundation for “indigenizing” Grand Canyon.
Turtle Talk 
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