FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:
Matt Ricchiazzi
716-548-3371
matt@muwekma.org
October 23, 2024

CHESTER TOWNSHIP, PA (October 23, 2024) – Tribal Chairwoman Charlene Nijmeh of the Bay Area’s Muwekma Ohlone Tribe was confronted this evening outside CNN’s Town Hall meeting featuring Vice President Kamala Harris, by several SWAT vehicles and armed military-style personnel in riot gear including shields, batons, bullet proof vests, and Kevlar helmets.

Nijmeh traveled to the Town Hall by horseback and was joined by a small group of tribal members, women, elders, and allies. She was blocked from attending the Town Hall meeting by an extraordinary display of force. Nijmeh hoped to pose a question to Harris regarding the Tribe’s longstanding struggle to affirm its federal status. The tribal members and their horses were blocked from the event and were not allowed to leave until the event was over creating a 2 hour long standoff.

Harris was born, raised, and built her political career on Muwekma land. For years, Harris has refused to meet with the Tribe’s chairwoman despite serving as United States Senator from January 2017 to January of 2021, and being twice elected as Attorney General of California.

The Tribe and it’s delegation in Washington just yesterday (on October 22nd) endured the cold shoulder of Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Zoe Lofgren, who both had their office doors locked upon hearing of Nijmeh’s arrival at the Longworth House Office Building. Earlier that morning, the Department of the Interior – which asked Nijmeh on October 21st to return on the 22nd to reschedule a meeting with Bureau of Indian Affairs’ officials – hired contracted security guards wearing badges that read “Special Police” to block her entry into the Department of the Interior.

Department officials unlawfully refused to allow Nijmeh and her delegation entry to the building, explicitly refusing to comply with the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That law guarantees that "All persons shall be entitled to the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, and accommodations of any place of public accommodation, as defined in this section, without discrimination on the ground of race, color, religion, or national origin.” It defines a public accommodation as “a place that offers goods or services to the public, including businesses, schools, and government offices."

“The Democrats talk a lot about Indian sovereignty, but when it comes to their actions, they’ve given us nothing but cold shoulders, locked doors, police violence, and now an outlandish military style confrontation that must have cost taxpayers $2 million in expenses,” Nijmeh postulates. “They would rather stare us down with guns than look at themselves in the mirror.”

The Chairwoman wants to know if military personnel were used to conduct this intimidation tactic on behalf of the current Administration, of which she has been vocally critical.

Nijmeh has called for accountability following violent police actions against her people by the Department of the Interior on October 15th and 16th, when a violent assault on her people by the National Parks Police subjected Native American women, children, and elders to “unnecessary, unprovoked, and unjustified police actions,” Nijmeh wrote in an open letter to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland.

Chairwoman Nijmeh detailed in her letter that these assaults highlight a continued colonial attitude within the Department of the Interior and raise significant concerns regarding the federal government’s continued mistreatment of Native Americans. “The events of October 15th and 16th were yet another horrible stain on America’s relationship with indigenous people,” she wrote, underscoring the distress caused by the police violence that left women and children bruised and traumatized.

What the Muwekma Ohlone Are Seeking

“The dispossession of Ohlone land is not unique to our tribe,” says Nijmeh. “Our people have traveled across the U.S. to seek justice; to seek the return of our tribe’s federal recognition, which was taken away illegally,” says Nijmeh. The Muwekma Ohlone Tribe was previously federally recognized as the Verona Band of Alameda County, and that recognition was never terminated by an act of Congress, and a federal district court judge in the Northern District of California affirmed that the Tribe has retained its sovereign immunity despite not being on the BIA’s list of officially recognized Tribes.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs erred when it wrongly omitted the Tribe from the official list of recognized Tribes when that list was first drafted in 1978. The Tribe has struggled for more than 45-years to affirm its federal status, petitioning the Congress for legislative recognition and petitioning the Administration for corrective action. “They reported that many of the Ohlone tribes did not need land and therefore did not need federal recognition, and they were wrong on both fronts,” says Nijmeh.

“The unwillingness to come to the defense of our people in our time of need will forever haunt your political career,” Chairwoman Nijmeh declared, advocating for recognition of sovereign rights and the respectful treatment of Indigenous peoples.

As a response to these incidents, the tribe will be pursuing transparency through a Freedom of Information Act request for internal communications relating to these events, advocating for accountability at every level of government interaction.

Many members of the Tribe suspect that Secretary Haaland’s office was well aware of the Tribe’s presence on the National Mall and deliberately ordered the violence against them.

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For additional quotes, interviews, pictures, video footage, or other information, please contact Matt Ricchiazzi via email at matt@muwekma.org, or via phone at 716-548-3371.

About the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe

The Muwekma Ohlone Tribe is at the National Mall in Washington D.C. through the coming election, on their Trail of Truth, to advocate for the return of the tribe’s federal recognition, which would give them the ability to operate as other federally recognized tribes do and protect their histories, cultures, and lifeways as a legal entity.

The Muwekma Ohlone Tribe was previously federally recognized as the Verona Band of Alameda County, was never terminated by an act of Congress, and a federal district court judge in the Northern District of California affirmed that the Tribe has retained its sovereign immunity despite not being on the BIA’s list of officially recognized Tribes.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs erred when it wrongly omitted the Tribe from the official list of recognized Tribes when that list was first drafted in 1978. The Tribe has struggled for more than 45-years to affirm its federal status, petitioning the Congress for legislative recognition and petitioning the Administration for corrective action.

For more visit:
https://muwekma.org/ToT/