PHOENIX, Ariz. – In a speech made on Oct. 25 President Joe Biden issued a public apology for the U.S. Government’s role in harmful Indian Boarding School policies.. The speech was made on the Gila River Indian Community Reservation in the presence of the tribe’s citizens, Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland and the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition. Although the Biden Administration has made reconciliation efforts through an investigative report published in May 2022, this is the first time a formal apology has been issued.
The apology comes just under two weeks before the general election on Nov. 5. Arizona is currently a swing state, one that is closely divided in a tight presidential race. During the 2020 presidential race, the state was won by a less than one percent margin. This is significant because Native Americans make up five percent of the state’s population. It is also home to the largest federally-recognized tribe in the country, Diné Nation.
The U.S. Department of the Interior’s Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative Investigative Report, released in two volumes, details the horrors seen during the Indian Boarding school era. This includes 417 institutions, an inflation-adjusted $23.3 billion to fund these institutions and 973 confirmed children deaths at school sites. These systemic practices lasted over a century.
“I formally apologize as the President of the United States of America for what we did to the Native Americans, Native Hawaiins, Native Alaskans who attended the boarding schools, this is long, long overdue,” President Biden said. “Quite frankly there is no excuse that this apology took 50 years to make. The federal boarding school policy and the pain it has caused will always be a significant mark of shame, a blot on American history.”
President Biden noted that the boarding school era lasted even after the American Civil Rights Movement, the same era he began his career in politics.
Secretary Haaland gave remarks on the significant occasion. She is the first Native American woman to serve in the cabinet position of the department that was once responsible for the implementation of Indian Boarding School policies. This issue is one that is personal to Secretary Haaland; her grandparents were Indian Boarding School survivors.
“For decades this terrible chapter was hidden from our history books,” Haaland said. “My maternal grandparents were only eight years old when they were stolen from their communities and forced to live in a Catholic Boarding School until the age of 13. My great grandfather was also taken and sent by train thousands of miles away from our small village of Mesita. Many children like them never went back home. I mourn their passing alongside you.”
In spite of the federal government’s attempts to separate Indigenous children from their families and cultures, Haaland noted that the intended purpose to annihilate tribal culture failed.
Gila River Indian Community Governor Stephen Roe Lewis reflected on the significance of a sitting president issuing a public apology on the Indian Boarding School system.
“That era represents a painful time in our country’s history,” Governor Lewis said. “It affects our boarding school survivors and our families today. That period of our history is one that created generational trauma.”
“With the president’s words today and his actions before and since, we can begin the healing that will resonate far into the future.”
Leadership from tribal nations across the country released statements on President Biden’s apology and what it means to Indian Country. In a public response, Muscogee (Creek) Nation Principal Chief David Hill welcomed Biden’s apology, stating it is a step in the right direction moving forward.
“We accept and welcome the public apology from President Biden on behalf of the United States,” Chief Hill said. “It is a continuation of the healing process from the atrocities committed against Indigenous People at Indian Boarding Schools.”
“This act of accountability, coupled with the actions of the Department of the Interior in analyzing and studying this history is vital to the path we’re all on towards reconciliation.”
The Department of the Interior is currently working with the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Mellon Foundation to create an oral collection of first-person narratives from boarding school survivors. According to Haaland, her department is in talks with the Smithsonian Institution and the Library of Congress to develop educational resources and exhibitions to share the history of the federal Indian Boarding School System.