Issue 018 · September 6, 2026
A new report from the Native American Rights Fund documents significant, layered obstacles to Native voting, from registration through ballot counting, with particular attention to reservation-based voters who face geographic, linguistic, and administrative barriers that compound one another. The report lands in the same week that the Trump administration's mail-in voting restrictions are drawing specific concern from Indian Country journalists, making the timing pointed. NARF is the right source here; their data is the foundation for the litigation that follows.
Issue 017 · August 30, 2026
A new report from the Native American Rights Fund documents significant, layered obstacles Native voters encounter from registration through ballot counting, arriving at a moment when mail-ballot litigation is reshaping the national landscape. The report's findings are not abstract: rural reservation communities with limited postal service, long distances to polling places, and ID requirements that don't match tribal enrollment documents are the specific mechanisms. Read alongside the Supreme Court mail-ballot ruling (candidate 72) for the full picture of what this midterm cycle looks like for Indian Country.
Issue 017 · August 30, 2026
ICT's investigative piece on a Texas group that claimed tribal identity, secured significant climate-movement funding, and appears to have fabricated its Indigenous credentials is uncomfortable and important reading. The story is a case study in what happens when the 4 R's, and especially Relationship and Responsibility, are bypassed in favor of a compelling narrative. It also raises questions about due diligence in Indigenous-led philanthropy that the broader movement needs to reckon with. Patty's framework for covering Native identity is exactly the lens this story needs.
Issue 016 · August 23, 2026
The U.S. Senate confirmed Mark Cruz, a citizen of the Klamath Tribes of Oregon, as director of the Indian Health Service by a 51-47 vote, ending a leadership vacuum that stretched across most of the current administration. Cruz becomes the twelfth Senate-confirmed IHS director. ICT broke the story; NCAI followed with a congratulatory statement. The confirmation matters for every Wisconsin nation that relies on IHS funding and policy guidance, and the Klamath Tribes' own history of dam removal and salmon restoration gives Cruz a TEK-informed background that Indian Country has rarely seen at this level.
Issue 015 · August 16, 2026
The Native American Rights Fund published a substantive piece on the 61st anniversary of the Voting Rights Act, documenting specific cases where the VRA has been used to challenge barriers to Native voting, including polling place access on reservations and language assistance requirements. The piece is a useful companion to the sovereignty and federal policy threads Patty tracks, and NARF's framing centers Native agency in using federal law rather than framing Native voters as passive victims of disenfranchisement.
Issue 015 · August 16, 2026
The U.S. Senate confirmed Mark Cruz, a citizen of the Klamath Tribes of Oregon, as director of the Indian Health Service by a 51-47 vote, ending a leadership vacuum that stretched nearly nineteen months and left the agency without a Senate-confirmed director through a period of significant federal health policy disruption. Cruz becomes the twelfth Senate-confirmed IHS director. ICT broke this story; the Native News Online piece covers the same confirmation but leads with the ICT report as the primary source. The confirmation matters for every Wisconsin nation whose members rely on IHS-funded services.
Issue 015 · August 16, 2026
A Brookings Institution report released this week found that private and government philanthropic funding to Native organizations lags far behind comparable grants to other communities, a pattern the report calls a violation of the federal trust responsibility. ICT's coverage leads with the data and includes reaction from tribal leaders who have spent years making this argument to foundation program officers. The finding is not surprising to anyone who has watched the funding landscape, but having Brookings put numbers to it gives tribal grant-seekers a new tool.
Issue 015 · August 16, 2026
Grist's investigation into the Carrizo Comecrudo Nation of Texas and its leader Juan Mancias is one of the most consequential pieces of Indigenous journalism published this year, examining how climate funders and organizers elevated a group whose federal recognition status and historical claims were contested, without doing the verification work that the 4 R's demand. The piece is not an attack on Indigenous climate activism; it is a rigorous account of what happens when relationship, respect, and responsibility are skipped in favor of a compelling narrative. For Patty, whose 5 R's framework was built precisely to prevent this kind of harm, the story is both a cautionary tale and a validation. It also raises hard questions about the Indigenous identity fraud problem that runs through Indian Country journalism, and about the due diligence obligations of foundations and media organizations that platform Native voices. Set aside fifteen minutes for this one.
Issue 014 · August 9, 2026
The Voting Rights Act, signed August 6, 1965, has been one of the most important legal tools for Native voters challenging discriminatory barriers at the ballot box. NARF's anniversary piece reviews the VRA's history and its current vulnerabilities under the current Supreme Court. For Wisconsin's tribal nations, whose members vote in counties where polling places have historically been scarce and access uneven, this is not abstract history.
Issue 014 · August 9, 2026
The U.S. Senate confirmed Mark Cruz, a citizen of the Klamath Tribes of Oregon, as the twelfth Senate-confirmed director of the Indian Health Service, ending a vacancy that stretched nearly nineteen months. ICT's account names Cruz's tribal citizenship and the vote count (51-47). The IHS serves every Wisconsin tribal nation's health programs, and the absence of confirmed leadership has had real downstream effects on funding and policy. Cruz's confirmation is the kind of institutional milestone that matters even when it arrives quietly.
Issue 010 · July 12, 2026
A White House report titled 'Saving America's Story' accused the National Museum of the American Indian and other Smithsonian institutions of promoting what it called anti-American narratives, drawing immediate and pointed pushback from tribal leaders and Native scholars. The Native Sun News piece captures the Indian Country response clearly. This is not an abstract culture-war skirmish: the NMAI is one of the most important public-facing institutions for Indigenous history and representation in the country, and the report's framing is a direct challenge to the sovereignty of Native peoples to tell their own stories.
Issue 008 · June 28, 2026
The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs held a nomination hearing for Mark Cruz, a citizen of the Klamath Tribes, to lead the Indian Health Service. The IHS directorship has been a revolving door in recent administrations, and a permanent, Senate-confirmed director who is himself a tribal citizen would be a meaningful change for Indian Country health infrastructure. Native News Online has the basics; the hearing outcome will be the more important story to track.
Issue 003 · May 24, 2026
President Trump signed the Tribal Trust Land Homeownership Act, which tribal housing leaders say is one of the most significant federal policy shifts for Native homeownership in years. The law targets the bureaucratic delays that have long made it nearly impossible for tribal members to obtain conventional mortgages on trust land. Native Sun News reports that tribal housing advocates across Indian Country are cautiously optimistic, while noting that implementation will determine whether the law delivers on its promise.
Issue 001 · May 10, 2026
The Native American Rights Fund released its 25-year retrospective on the Tribal Supreme Court Project this week, documenting a quarter century of coordinated advocacy before the nation's highest court on behalf of tribal sovereignty. The report is a useful reference document, and its timing alongside the new ICWA challenge is pointed: the Project exists precisely because the Supreme Court is not a neutral forum, and tribal nations need sustained, coordinated legal strategy to navigate it. Worth downloading for your files.
Issue 001 · May 10, 2026
Native News Online hosted a watch party and live commentary as former Interior Secretary Deb Haaland faced Sam Bregman in a New Mexico gubernatorial debate this week. The moment is worth noting beyond the horse-race framing: Haaland's candidacy represents a direct translation of federal Indian policy experience into state executive politics, and New Mexico's tribal nations have significant stakes in who governs. ICT's Pauly Denetclaw was among the commentators, which is the kind of Native-press-first framing this brief tries to privilege.
Issue 001 · May 10, 2026
The Native American Rights Fund published a clear-eyed explainer on tribal sovereignty and birthright citizenship, addressing the question of whether current legal debates about the Fourteenth Amendment affect the citizenship status of tribal members. The piece is careful to distinguish tribal citizenship from U.S. citizenship and to ground the analysis in the pre-constitutional existence of tribal nations. It is a useful resource for anyone navigating these questions in a policy or classroom context.
Issue 001 · May 10, 2026
High Country News published a reported piece this week on the 'Red Wind commune,' a case study in Indigenous identity fraud and the real harm it causes to Native communities, from diluted cultural authority to legal and financial exploitation. The piece is careful and does not sensationalize, which is the right approach to a story that can easily tip into spectacle. For Patty, who has spent a career insisting on the specificity of tribal citizenship and the difference between self-identification and belonging, this is a story with direct professional relevance.
Background
· 2024
· brothertown-indian-nation
Formed in the 1700s under the leadership of Samson Occom from communities descended from Pequot, Narragansett, Montauk, Tunxis, Niantic, and Mohegan tribes, the Brothertown Indian Nation now centers its community in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. The nation operates under a constitutional government and holds its annual powwow the first Saturday in April, a community picnic in July, and a Homecoming gathering the third Saturday in October. Tribal officials continue to coordinate the congressional restoration effort with Wisconsin's delegation.
Background
· 2023
· brothertown-indian-nation
Following the BIA denial, the Brothertown Indian Nation pivoted to the only remaining path: congressional restoration. The tribe has worked with Wisconsin congressional delegates to introduce restoration bills and has continued to operate from its Fond du Lac County base. The 3,137-member nation traces continuous community to the 1839 termination and before, with leadership consistently arguing that descent verification and community continuity are not in genuine dispute.
Background
· 2012
· Bureau of Indian Affairs press releases
In August 2009, Acting Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary George Skibine issued a proposed finding against acknowledging the Brothertown Indian Nation. The September 2012 final determination confirmed the denial, holding that the 1839 Act of Congress had terminated the federal relationship and that only a new act of Congress could restore it. The Brothertown are the only one of Wisconsin's twelve tribes that remain without federal recognition.