Native veterans support Deb Haaland ahead of historic vote
Monday, March 15, 2021
WASHINGTON, D.C. Native veterans and allies are stepping up to support Rep. Deb Haaland (D-New Mexico) ahead of her final historic vote as Secretary of the Interior.
Haaland, a citizen of the Pueblo of Laguna, comes from a military family. Her mother served in the U.S. Navy and her father was in the U.S. Marine Corps, a history she shared at her confirmation hearing last month.
“My mother is a Navy veteran, was a civil servant at the Bureau of Indian Education for 25 years, and she raised four kids as a military wife,” Haaland told the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources during her opening statement on February 23.
Recap: #DebForInterior confirmation hearing
Haaland, a citizen of the Pueblo of Laguna, spoke in the Keres language, acknowledged the nation’s capital as the homelands of the Nakochtank, Anacostan and Piscataway peoples and responded to numerous questions about the Biden administration’s priorities should be confirmed to lead the Department of the Interior at the hearing on Tuesday.
“If an Indigenous woman from humble beginnings can be confirmed as Secretary of the Interior, our country holds promise for everyone,” Haaland said in her opening statement.
Thank you, to my friend @RepDonYoung for introducing me at my confirmation hearing. I’m incredibly grateful for your support and the bipartisan solutions we were able to accomplish together. pic.twitter.com/IzBbahwSiF Deb Haaland (@DebHaalandNM) February 23, 2021
23 Feb 2021
Rep. Deb Haaland (D-NM) said on Tuesday at her confirmation hearing to be secretary of the Department of the Interior (DOI) that she had to “acknowledge” that Capitol Hill, which includes the U.S. Capitol and House and Senate office buildings, is on land belonging to Native Americans.
“I wouldn’t be here without the love and support of my child Somah, partner Skip, my mom Mary Toya, my extended family, and generations of ancestors who sacrificed so much so I could be here today,” Haaland said in her opening statement before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. “I acknowledge that we are on the ancestral homelands of the Nacotchtank, Anacostan, and Piscataway people.”
“She said her name was Deb Haaland,” Warren recalled. “I’d never heard of her.”
Haaland was volunteering for the presidential campaign of a senator named Barack Obama, and she wanted Warren to travel to the Laguna Pueblo, the Native American enclave Haaland hailed from, to speak to locals about the election’s importance.
When Warren arrived, he found potluck food and 20 people. Haaland apologized for the low
turnout. He waved her off, impressed by the unknown activist s embrace of grassroots politics and tireless work ethic.
Fast forward since then and the number of people who have heard of Haaland has grown exponentially. Now that same political savvy she used to mobilize Native voters in 2008 for a victorious Obama has helped her once again make history.
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