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Last year Alaskans voted to have open primaries and ranked choice voting. The first run through of the new process is underway in a special election to fill the position of Alaska’s sole Congressional representative.
There are 48 candidates to pick from in the special election. Four of those candidates are Alaska Native candidates. Ballots must be postmarked by or before June 11.
The top four candidates’ names will go on the ballot in an August election. Voters will rank their choices as first, second, third and fourth. The winner will be the person who gets 50 percent plus 1 of the votes. The lowest vote-getter is dropped. Their votes go to the second choice shown on their ballots, and so on until one candidate gets a majority of votes. READ MORE– Joaqlin Estus, ICT
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Around the world: An Indigenous-led program in Australia is helping First Nations people into homeownership, Indigenous youth in Montreal blend traditions and contemporary art, Traditional Owners take the Australian government to court over a proposed nuclear dump site, an international Indigenous duet brings powwow-goers to tears, and a record number of Aboriginal candidates have been elected to Australia’s Parliament. READ MORE– Deusdedit Ruhangariyo, Special to ICT
TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – A standing-room-only crowd gathered in Tahlequah to celebrate the life and legacy of the Cherokee Nation’s first female principal chief, Wilma P. Mankiller, who is now immortalized on a U.S. quarter released June 6.
“She’s a legend,” Cherokee Nation citizen Henry Carey Jr., 66, of Tahlequah, said. “She deserves it. Wilma Mankiller, she was a freedom fighter, fighting way before she was chief. I really respect her. So I wanted to get some of these quarters.”
Current and past tribal leaders, Mankiller’s family, friends and hundreds of others turned out for the release of a limited number of the coins, which feature the late chief wrapped in a traditional shawl with “a resolute gaze to the future” on the reverse side. READ MORE – Chad Hunter, Cherokee Phoenix
The pond is full again at Upingaksraq Spring Alaska Schreiner’s high desert farm. It’s a welcome sight for Schreiner, who owns Sakari Farms north of Bend, Oregon.
Last summer, as drought punished Central Oregon, Schreiner’s irrigation district stopped delivering water. She watched as the pond gradually disappeared, leaving a mud puddle behind.
“I cried last year when I walked through the dry canal,” Schreiner told Oregon Public Broadcasting. “I was pissed. I was like, ‘There’s nothing we can do.’” READ MORE – Bradley W. Parks, Oregon Public Broadcast/Associated Press
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Primary elections were held in seven states on Tuesday. A number of those states included large Native populations and Native candidates. ICT political correspondent Pauly Denetclaw joins us now to break it down.
Shelia Tucker, YellowQuill Anishinaabe, is a fashion designer based in Phoenix. Her work has been featured on runways in Arizona, Los Angeles, and even in Paris for fashion week. This upcoming July, her work is expected to be showcased on a billboard in Times Square.
America is at a crossroads, and the political divide has never been more profound. ICT regular contributor Holly Cook Macarro, Red Lake Nation, is back to talk politics. READ MORE– ICT
WATCH:
FORT SUMNER, N.M. — They named the area near this place Bosque Redondo, after a grove of cottonwoods near the river.
The Navajo imprisoned there called it “Hwéeldi.” Some say that translates to “place of suffering.”
It might as well have been called hell.
It was near here, in Billy the Kid country, that the U.S. government attempted to strip members of the Navajo Nation and Mescalero Apache tribe of their language, culture and spiritual beliefs in the 1860s. READ MORE– Robert Nott, Santa Fe New Mexican/Associated Press
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- Conservative Indigenous candidates vie for congressional seats: Updated: Less government oversight is a mainstay of these Republican candidates. At least one Democrat is on a ballot. #NativeVote22.
- Indigenous farmer seeks solutions in drought: ‘It’s imperative that we look for guidance from Indigenous people on fire management, climate change, water usage, how we grow our crops, when, why. No one asks us how to do things.’
- Indigenous expert, journalist still missing in Brazil: The place where they went missing is the primary access route to Brazil’s second-largest Indigenous territory, which is bigger than Maine and where several thousand Indigenous people live.
- New exhibit shows Navajo Nation’s suffering, resiliency: The exhibition draws on historical documents, oral accounts and takes the visitor on a journey back to the 1860s through today.
- An Indigenous ProducerWas Turned Away From the Cannes Red Carpet For Wearing Moccasins
- Ethan Hawke Presents Peabody Award to ‘Reservation Dogs’: “Unlike Anything We’ve Ever Seen”
- Indigenous economic strategyoffers blueprint for reducing poverty and bolstering economy, agencies say
- Minneapolis American Indian Centeraffirms its place in the neighborhood with huge renovation
- ‘Dark Traffic’ mourns the disruption and erasure of the Indigenous people and cultureof the North
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