For more than a century, from the early 1800s to the 1960s, Indigenous children were taken from their tribes — sometimes forcibly from their homes — to attend government assimilation boarding schools. On Friday afternoon, President Joe Biden will issue a formal apology from the U.S. government to impacted communities.
Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native American to hold a Cabinet position, says her grandparents and mother were among those shipped off to these schools: “I understand that history,” she told host Brad Mielke on Friday’s episode of “Start Here,” ABC News’ flagship daily news podcast.
Elementary school class of Indian students with botanical specimens at United States Indian School, Carlisle, Pennsylvania, 1901. (Boarding school for Native American students, founded in 1879 under US governmental authority).
Frances Benjamin Johnston/Heritage Images via Getty Images
“The children got to these boarding schools. They were stripped of their clothing. Their hair was cut. They were forbidden to speak their native languages and were beat if they did,” said Haaland.
Haaland went on a reservation listening tour to hear from tribal elders and descendants of people who attended these schools as part of a federal investigation into the government’s boarding school programs and the reported physical and emotional abuse as well as death that took place.
U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland speaks on stage during the final day of the Democratic National Convention at the United Center on Aug. 22, 2024 in Chicago.
Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
She also investigated those who never made it home, and found that hundreds of children had been buried at unmarked sites far away from their homes.
As part of her investigation, Haaland put together a list of recommendations, the first of which is to issue a formal acknowledgment and apology from the U.S. government.
Debating class, Carlisle Indian School, Carlisle, Pennsylvania, 1901. A young woman standing before a group of seated students. A partially visible chalkboard says “Debate. Resolved: That the U.S. Senate”
Frances Benjamin Johnston/Heritage Images via Getty Images
The White Rose Singers, consisting of students from Sherman Indian High School, an off-reservation boarding high school for Native Americans in Riverside, sing native songs on the Morongo Indian Reservation near Banning, California, April 11, 2015.
David Mcnew/AFP via Getty Images
President Biden told White House reporters Thursday that he’s going to Arizona “to do something that should have been done a long time ago.”
“To make a formal apology to the Indian nations for the way we treated their children for so many years,” he said. “That’s why I’m going. That’s why I’m heading west.”
Haaland told “Start Here” that an apology is the first step in working toward a remedy to the trauma and pain.
“Quite frankly, Native American history is American history, so it’s important for the survivors and the descendants, I believe, to feel that they are seen.”
ABC News’ Justin Gomez contributed to this report.
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