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Cherokee Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin, Jr. calls the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act (ISDEA) “one of the singular accomplishments of this country”. The legislation championed by President Richard Nixon opened the doors to tribal control over their own health care, law enforcement, natural resources management and economic development. We’ll look at the progress since ISDEA, and what tribes intend to strengthen self-governance in the future.

GUESTS

W. Ron Allen (Jamestown S’klallam), tribal chairman for the Jamestown S’klallam Tribe

Jay Spaan (Cherokee), executive director of the Self-Governance Communication and Education Tribal Consortium

Laura Harris (Comanche), executive director for Americans for Indian Opportunity

 

Break 1 Music: Traveling Song (song) Judy Trejo (artist) Circle Dance Songs of the Paiute and Shoshone (album)

Break 2 Music: Vipismal – The Hummingbird Song (song) Earl Ray (artist) Traditional Songs Of The Salt River Pima (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:44 — 38.3MB) | Embed

Indigenous business leaders in the U.S. and all over the world will now have to adjust to the uncertain effects of President Donald Trump’s aggressive new series of tariffs. Economic experts predict some measure of chaos in the short term. It’s impossible to predict how the tariffs will play out in the long run, but it will certainly affect everything from the beads used in regalia to groceries to auto sales. Trump insists the new tariffs will put American businesses on a more level playing field and boost the federal government’s coffers. We’ll hear how Native business experts are responding to the new economic reality.

GUESTS

Tabatha Bull (Nipissing First Nation), president and CEO of Canadian Council for Indigenous Business

John Desjarlais (Cree-Métis), executive director of the Indigenous Resource Network

Dante Biss-Grayson (Osage), founder of Sky-Eagle Collection

Tally Monteau (Hunkpati Dakota and Chippewa-Cree), program manager for the Native American Development Corporation (NADC) Triia program and beadwork artist

Benjamin Haile (Shinnecock), owner of Thunder Island Coffee Roasters

 

Break 1 Music: Mr. Businessman’s Blues (song) DM Lafortune (artist) Beauty and Hard Times (album)

Break 2 Music: Scream, Holler, and Howl (song) Blue Moon Marquee (artist) Scream, Holler, and Howl (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:54 — 38.4MB) | Embed

Indigenous people in Canada suffered a noticeably disproportionate number of fatal interactions with law enforcement in 2024. In one three-month period, 15 Indigenous people died either in custody or from direct interactions with police. It prompted the Assembly of First Nations and other Indigenous leaders to call for a national inquiry. It also inspired the news program, APTN Investigates, to pry into the factors that contribute to such an imbalance in the justice system. Their new three-part series looks into the strained relationship between Indigenous people and law enforcement. We’ll talk with APTN Investigates team members about their findings.

We’ll also hear from Marvin Roberts, the Athabascan man who just settled a wrongful conviction lawsuit against the city of Fairbanks, Alaska for $11.5 million. Roberts is one of the men – all Native – deemed the “Fairbanks Four”. They were all convicted and imprisoned for the 1997 murder of a teenager. They were released in 2015 after another man confessed to the crime.

GUESTS

Cullen Crozier (Gwich’in, Dene, and Métis), producer with APTN Investigates

Tamara Pimental (Métis), video journalist with APTN Investigates

Tom Fennario, video journalist with APTN Investigates

Marvin Roberts (Athabascan), one of the “Fairbanks Four”

Reilly Cosgrove, partner at Kramer and Cosgrove law firm

 

Break 1 Music: Unity (song) Native Roots (artist) Most High (album)

Break 2 Music: Scream, Holler, and Howl (song) Blue Moon Marquee (artist) Scream, Holler, and Howl (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:52 — 38.4MB) | Embed

For the first time in decades, tribes in the Pacific Northwest will be able to forage for wild huckleberries in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest without competition from commercial companies. The development comes after decades of work by the Yakama Nation and other tribes in a contentious dispute, all while the culturally important wild berry abundance has dwindled.

Foraging is also important to the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe in southern Colorado. A collaboration between the tribe and a conservation nonprofit to facilitate foraging on nearby private land just got a significant boost.

GUESTS

Elaine Harvey (Ḱamíłpa Band of the Yakama Nation), watershed department manager for the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission

Bronsco Jim Jr., chief of the Ḱamíłpa Band of the Yakama Nation

Josephine Woolington, journalist in Portland

Treston Chee (Diné), Indigenous lands program field coordinator with Trees, Water & People

MENTIONED:

“The true cost of the huckleberry industry” by Josephine Woolington for High Country News

Break 1 Music: Honoring The Homeland (song) Radmilla & Herman Cody (artist) Shi Kéyah (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 56:09 — 38.6MB) | Embed

The Trump Administration is backtracking on some of the looming changes at the Social Security Administration (SSA) after widespread complaints from the public, advocates, and elected leaders. But staffing and budget cuts are already creating backlogs and delays for recipients. SSA is delaying for two weeks a new requirement for in-person identity checks, but significant changes are still on the way. We’ll talk about what those changes are for Native American elders and how they can prepare for them.

GUESTS

Rosalind Asetamy (Comanche), chairperson for the elder council of the Comanche Nation

Larry Curley (Navajo), grant writer and consultant

Judith Kozlowski, elder justice consultant and is a consultant with the International Association for Indian Aging

Michael Bird (Santo Domingo Pueblo and Ohkay Owingeh), past president of the American Public Health Association and past national consultant for AARP

 

Break 1 Music: 500 Years O’ Blues (song) Digging Roots (artist) Seeds (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:52 — 38.4MB) | Embed

Vaccines for the coronavirus have reduced the scope and severity of COVID-19 infections, but for as many as a third of the people who contract COVID, symptoms of the disease persist and cause potentially disabling affects day after day. Long COVID affects as many as 23 million Americans. Symptoms include persistent headaches, fatigue, shortness of breath, and memory and concentration problems. In addition to the personal and medical burdens, several studies indicate the global financial drain from long COVID is anywhere from $1 trillion to $6 trillion. The Trump administration just announced it is closing the federal office that facilitates research and information-sharing among medical institutions on long COVID.

GUESTS

Rebecca Nagle (Cherokee), writer, advocate, host of the podcast This Land, and author of By the Fire We Carry

Rita Bilagody (Navajo), activist and grandma

Troy Montserrat-Gonzales (Lumbee and Chicana), mental health therapist and health care consultant

Dr. Ivy Hurowitz, associate professor Division of Infectious Diseases at University of New Mexico Department of Internal Medicine

Dr. Douglas Perkins, professor of Medicine and director of the Center for Global Health in the University of New Mexico Department of Internal Medicine

 

Break 1 Music: Healing Song (song) Red Hawk Medicine Drum (artist) New Beginnings (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:38 — 38.2MB) | Embed

The unpredictable availability of salmon and other fish in Alaska is putting additional pressure on the practice of subsistence fishing for Alaska Native residents. A federal board just opened up subsistence fishing and hunting — something reserved only for rural residents — to all 14,000 residents of Ketchikan. The State of Alaska is fighting a federal panel’s approval of a COVID-era emergency subsistence hunt for citizens in Kake. Meanwhile, stakeholders are closely watching a legal conflict over fishing on the Kuskokwim River that has implications for decades of legal precedents over subsistence fishing access.

GUESTS

Ilsxílee Stáng / Gloria Burns (Haida), president of the Ketchikan Indian Community

Nathaniel Amdur-Clark (Citizen Potawatomi), partner at Sonosky, Chambers, Sachse, Miller, and Monkman, LLP

 

Break 1 Music: They Sing to Each Other (song) Pamyua (artist) Side A Side B (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)