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Activities at Native organizations and a tribal college in Minneapolis, Minn., were canceled after a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent fatally shot a woman Wednesday morning in the city.
The Minneapolis American Indian Center canceled its Wednesday night programs due to community safety concerns and ICE activity in the neighborhood.
The Red Lake Nation College, the Red Lake Nation Embassy, and the tribe’s wellness center in Minneapolis closed Wednesday, and are expected to be closed for the rest of the week due to due the incident.
MIGIZI, which supports Native youth in the Twin Cities, also canceled its programming.
Tribes are expressing concerns about the incident and the safety of Native community members living in the Twin Cities.
The Red Lake Tribal Council is urging its citizens to be careful, and to avoid ICE and other federal agents.
The council released a two-page written message Wednesday, outlining concerns, which includes asking tribal members to report any interactions with ICE to the tribe’s council or embassy.
The Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa also raised concerns in a written message to its community about the safety of tribal members living in the Twin Cities.
Robert Pilot is the host of Native Roots Radio based in the Twin Cities. He says the Native community is feeling the impacts of the shooting.
“The reaction I’ve seen with the Native community is been just a gasp of what’s happened. 75,000 Native Americans live in Minneapolis (Twin Cities area). In that area of the shooting, there’s a very high percentage of Native Americans that live in that community, and they feel their community is being attacked by the federal government.”
Pilot says members of the Native community are standing with their allies and took part in demonstrations against ICE on Wednesday in the area of the shooting.
“There was a woman Native singer group that sang and it’s all about the healing. And I think the community, especially that community really knows that the Native community is really involved and really vetted into everything that happens there, happens to them. It was only a very short blocks away from the murder of George Floyd and that community is so scarred, but we have a resilience and our Native community is there and was there and is there and will still be there … we also are a big part of the community. And we want people to be safe, but we also want to be heard and be out there and support our community too, because this is our community too and all of Turtle Island is our community.”
The woman killed was identified as 37-year-old Renee Good.
The Trump administration is justifying the shooting, while the city’s mayor disputes that and is demanding ICE leave Minneapolis.
The Sandra Day O’Connor U.S. Courthouse in Phoenix, Ariz. (Photo: Gabriel Pietrorazio / KJZZ)
A three-judge panel in Phoenix, Ariz., heard arguments on Wednesday over continuing a court-ordered injunction blocking a controversial land exchange.
As KJZZ’s Gabriel Pietrorazio reports, the land swap would result in a copper mining operation that is estimated to create a two-mile-wide crater, devouring an Apache holy site.
It’s been 140 days since the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals delayed a land swap first approved by Congress more than a decade ago.
According to the 2015 law, 2,400 acres of Tonto National Forest must be turned over to Resolution Copper within 60 days of a final environmental impact statement being published, which happened in June.
Plaintiffs in three different cases include the Arizona Mining Reform Coalition, San Carlos Apache Tribe, and a group of Apache women and girls.
Defendants asked for the injunction to be lifted, which could lead to an immediate public land transfer.
The judges did not say when their decision will be made.
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