A protester outside of Trump Tower in New York City, New York. Photo: Chris Beckett

Harold Frazier: Indian Country suffers during #TrumpShutdown

Statement regarding Partial Government Shutdown
By Harold Frazier
Chairman, Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe
@CRSTChairman

Yet again the United States government has shutdown services due to the inability of government officials to run it.

I have been told that all of this is due to a wall that the President of the United States wants to build. I condemn the actions of the President of the United States and the Federal government.

If the President of the United States wants to build something that would make America great again, then build bridges. Build bridges to span the division that the President’s spoiled child rhetoric has created. Build bridges between people, cultures, societies or nations and if that is too hard then at least build bridges in our aging infrastructure of roads.

The President of the United States should quit trying to build a wall that would have been better served at Plymouth Rock in 1492.

The truth of the matter is that the Native American people will suffer during this partial shutdown. The United States’ treaty obligations to native nations is the first thing to be thrown out the door during this shutdown.

Indigenous people are not immigrants to this land. Have we not suffered enough because of the immigrants the United States brought to this land?

Harold Frazier is serving his third term as chairman of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, based in South Dakota. He also serves as president of the Great Plains Tribal Chairmen’s Association. He previously served as vice chair of his tribe and previously as an area vice president for the National Congress of American Indians.

Join the Conversation