Indigenous Peoples Day Looks to the Election

As Native Americans come together on Monday for Indigenous Peoples Day to celebrate their history and culture and acknowledge the ongoing challenges they face, many are doing so with a focus on the election. From a voting rally in Minneapolis featuring food, games, and raffles to a public talk about the Native vote at Virginia Tech, the holiday—which comes about three weeks before Election Day—features an array of events geared toward voter mobilization and outreach as recognition of the power of Native people's votes grows. While not a federal holiday, per the AP, Indigenous Peoples Day is observed by 17 states, plus Washington, DC, according to the Pew Research Center.

More than 200 people were registered to vote in a matter of hours at the Minneapolis event, where volunteers handed out T-shirts, stickers, and posters created from designs commissioned from artists with tribal affiliations. The theme was clear: Make voting a tradition. In 2020, Native voters proved decisive in the presidential election. Voter turnout on tribal land in Arizona increased dramatically compared with the previous presidential election, helping Joe Biden win a state that hadn't supported a Democratic candidate in a White House contest since 1996, per the AP.

Janeen Comenote, of the National Urban Indian Family Coalition, cautioned that Native people are in no way a monolith in terms of how they vote. "We're really all about just getting Native voters out to vote, not telling them how to vote. But sort of understanding that you have a voice and you're a democracy, a democracy that we helped create," said Comenote, a citizen of the Quinault Indian Nation. In Arizona, a town hall Monday called "Democracy Is Indigenous: Power of the Native Vote" featured speakers and performances, along with Indigenous artwork centered on democracy. Navajo artist Richelle Key, who was commissioned to create a painting during the event, said, "It's important to vote because we don't want to be forgotten."

(More Indigenous People's Day stories.)