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Biden apologizes for government's role in running Native American boarding schools

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

President Biden has apologized for the government's role in running boarding schools for Native American children, calling it yesterday a blot on American history. For decades, thousands of Native children at those schools endured abuse, family separation, neglect and the erasure of their tribal identities. Member station KJZZ's Gabriel Pietrorazio reports.

GABRIEL PIETRORAZIO, BYLINE: On the outskirts of Phoenix, at the Gila River Indian Reservation, President Biden tried to make amends for the U.S.'s 150-year campaign to forcibly assimilate indigenous children.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: I formally apologize as President of the United States America for what we did. I formally apologize.

(CHEERING)

BIDEN: It's long overdue.

PIETRORAZIO: Overdue by more than half a century - the federal Indian boarding school era began in 1819 and didn't end until 1969, a year before Biden held public office for the first time.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BIDEN: I believe it's important that we do know - you know, generations of native children stolen, taken away to places they didn't know, with people they'd never met who spoke a language they had never heard.

PIETRORAZIO: Biden noted that children were routinely punished, sometimes beaten, just for speaking their language, wearing tribal clothing or growing their hair long. The Interior Department has documented nearly 1,000 confirmed deaths across more than 500 native boarding schools nationwide.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BIDEN: It's horribly, horribly wrong. It's a sin on our soul. I'd like to ask, with your permission, for a moment of silence as we remember those lost and the generations living with that trauma.

PIETRORAZIO: What the president called an attempt to right a wrong resonated with the crowd filled with tribal leaders.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

STEPHEN ROE LEWIS: I think we can say with no exaggeration that President Biden truly is Indian country's president.

(CHEERING)

PIETRORAZIO: That's Governor Stephen Roe Lewis of the Gila River Indian Community. He thanked Biden for what he called his compassionate leadership.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

LEWIS: And with the President's words today and his actions before and since, we can begin the healing.

PIETRORAZIO: That healing starts with Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. She's the first Native American cabinet member. For the last four years, she has led the very same agency responsible for generations of harm.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

DEB HAALAND: But as we stand here together, my friends and relatives, we know that the federal government failed.

(CHEERING)

HAALAND: It failed to annihilate our languages, our traditions, our life ways. It failed to destroy us because we persevered.

PIETRORAZIO: Biden's first diplomatic trip to Indian country comes just 10 days before Election Day and the swing state Arizona, where the Native vote is front and center.

SANDRA MILLER: I pictured my grandmother getting her hair cut and just being really emotional.

PIETRORAZIO: Sandra Miller's from the Tohono O'odham Nation and with the Arizona Democratic Party. She says this apology is already resonating with indigenous voters.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

MILLER: He still sees us, and he still wants us to heal, even as he's saying his farewell.

PIETRORAZIO: A chorus of - thank you, Joe - chants rang out, as O'odham tribal performers sang and danced Biden offstage.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

UNIDENTIFIED PEOPLE: (Chanting in non-English language).

PIETRORAZIO: For NPR News, I'm Gabriel Pietrorazio on the Gila River Indian Reservation. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

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Gabriel Pietrorazio