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The U.S. Interior Department released a first-of-its-kind report last week that named the 408 schools the federal government supported to strip Native Americans of their cultures and identities. At least 500 children died at some of the schools, but that number is expected to reach into the thousands or tens of thousands as more research is completed.
Deb Haaland is pushing the U.S. government to reckon with its role in Native American boarding schools like no other Cabinet secretary could backed by personal experience, a struggle with losing her own Native language and a broader community that has felt the devastating impacts.
Public schools were closed and evacuation bags packed this week as a stubborn wildfire crept within a few miles of the city of Los Alamos and its companion U.S. national security lab where assessing apocalyptic threats is a specialty and wildland fire is a beguiling equation.
A new Interior Department report on the legacy of boarding schools for Native Americans underscores how closely the U.S. government collaborated with churches to Christianize them as part of a project to sever them from their culture, their identities and ultimately their land.