Haaland, Deb

Subterms

    Latest story

    75 Shares149 Views

    Indigenous Voters Mobilize in Midterm Elections

    by

    ANCHORAGE — Tesla Cox’s eyes filled with tears as she thought about watching her state elect its first Alaska Native to Congress this year, and what it could mean for the future.“If we can mobilize our people, we can really shift the way that our world is working for us,” said Ms. Cox, 31, who is Tlingit and gathered late last month with other Alaska Natives for a three-day convention, where their influence as a voting bloc was a major topic of discussion.“Our next steps are not just getting our people to go and vote, but getting our people to be the people that people vote for,” she said.Indigenous voters have become a major power center across the country in recent years, including in 2020, when the Navajo Nation and other Indigenous voters helped flip Arizona for President Biden. This Congress saw the first Native Hawaiian and Alaska Native elected and seated alongside enrolled members of tribes from Oklahoma and Kansas. The Senate confirmed Deb Haaland, a member of the Pueblo of Laguna, as the first Native American to serve as interior secretary.It is a trend that is expected to continue on Tuesday, when races that will determine control of both the House and Senate may come down to razor-thin margins in states with sizable Indigenous populations. There are nearly 90 Indigenous candidates on state and national ballots, according to a database maintained by Indian Country Today, a nonprofit news organization. Those candidates include Markwayne Mullin, an Oklahoma Republican who is likely to become the first Cherokee senator since 1925.“We’ve made a lot of progress in the country and we’ve made progress in the judiciary and in Congress and across the federal administrations,” said Chuck Hoskin Jr., the principal chief of the Cherokee Nation. “For us not to turn out during the midterms would send an unfortunate message to policymakers that our numbers aren’t there.”Alaska Native corporations have offered key endorsements that could help Representative Mary Peltola of Alaska, a Democrat who is Yup’ik, and Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, a Republican who was formally adopted by a clan of the Tlingit tribe, keep their seats in Congress and overcome conservative challengers.Representative Mary Peltola, Democrat of Alaska, is the first Alaska Native in Congress.Ash Adams for The New York TimesSenator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska is the top Republican on the Senate Indian Affairs Committee.Brian Adams for The New York TimesThe five major tribal nations in Oklahoma have offered a rare joint endorsement of the Democratic candidate for governor, jolting the race into a tossup, while the Cherokee Nation has reignited its campaign for the United States to fulfill a nearly 200-year-old treaty and seat Kimberly Teehee as their congressional delegate.“We’ve been in a process of people awakening to the power of our collective voice,” said Judith LeBlanc, of the Caddo Nation in Oklahoma, and the executive director of Native Organizers Alliance. “That collective voice can manifest itself as political power on Election Day and in between election days on the issues that we’re advocating for.”The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsElection Day is Tuesday, Nov. 8.House Democrats: Several moderates elected in 2018 in conservative-leaning districts are at risk of being swept out. That could cost the Democrats their House majority.A Key Constituency: A caricature of the suburban female voter looms large in American politics. But in battleground regions, many voters don’t fit the stereotype.Crime: In the final stretch of the campaigns, politicians are vowing to crack down on crime. But the offices they are running for generally have little power to make a difference.Abortion: The fall of Roe v. Wade seemed to offer Democrats a way of energizing voters and holding ground. Now, many worry that focusing on abortion won’t be enough to carry them to victory.The assertion of political power and sovereignty comes as the Supreme Court seems poised to challenge some tribal authorities and protections and Indigenous voters face steep barriers to the ballot box. They could not vote in every state until 1957 and now face increasingly restrictive voting laws passed by state legislatures. Distances to polling stations still could require round trips of 100 or more miles for some voters.In May, a federal judge ruled that South Dakota violated portions of the National Voter Registration Act, which requires state officials to provide voter registration renewal guidance at several state-run agencies.“The majority of voting access laws that were passed since 2020 have all been passed in states where the Native vote is politically significant and it therefore targets Native voters,” Ms. LeBlanc said. “And it has a big impact, especially when it comes to early voting, access to voting, voting locations and transportation to voting locations.”Beyond representation in the highest seats of government, there has been an increased acknowledgment of needs of tribal communities across the country, though lawmakers say far more needs to be done to fulfill their obligations.A document circulated by Democrats on the Senate Indian Affairs Committee noted that lawmakers had approved the largest direct investment in tribal governments in American history in 2021 with passage of the $1.9 trillion stimulus law, and set aside billions of dollars for tribal health care, housing, broadband and transportation. Tribal nations and villages will receive funds through a new program created under the Biden administration to help them relocate and avoid the toll of climate change.People attending the Alaska Native Federation candidates forum in Anchorage last month. All of the top candidates in congressional elections made appearances.Brian Adams for The New York Times“It’s a long game and change doesn’t happen overnight,” said Allie Redhorse Young, of the Navajo Nation and founder of Protect the Sacred, who led voters on horseback to polling stations in 2020 and will lead a similar ride this year. “But as we continue to show up and as we continue to make our voices heard and ensure that our votes are counted, the more we will invest in this change.”In 1955, only one Alaska Native was elected to serve among the 55 delegates at the state’s constitutional convention. Sixty-six years later, Ms. Peltola made history in September as the first Alaska Native elected to Congress, when she was sworn in to finish the remainder of Representative Don Young’s term following his death. She is running for her first full term representing a state where Alaska Natives account for about 15 percent of the population.“It’s a remarkable evolution, really,” said William L. Iggiagruk Hensley, 81, a Democrat who is Inupiaq and served as a state senator. He was among those who were instrumental in the passage of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, which set aside about 44 million acres for a dozen regional native corporations in 1971 and elevated Alaska Natives into a pivotal role for the new state’s economy.“Our people have seen the importance of participating in the political process and have done so extensively,” he added.Mr. Hensley, like others who gathered for three days in Anchorage at the Alaska Federation of Natives convention, pointed to the role of Alaska Natives in helping Ms. Murkowski mount a successful write-in campaign in 2010 as another moment that underscored their political might. Ms. Murkowski has worked closely with Senator Brian Schatz, Democrat of Hawaii, to direct millions of dollars to the Indigenous communities in their states as the top lawmakers on the Senate Indian Affairs Committee.William L. Iggiagruk Hensley, Faye Ewan and Tesla Cox.Brian Adams for The New York TimesRyen Aavurauq Richards, who is Inupiaq, said she has seen that change in recent years, in part because Indigenous voters have come together more frequently advocating issues that impact their way of life, from commercial fishing to taking care of their lands. She once felt disconnected from the political process because to her the outcome of races in Alaska appeared predetermined.“The more that all of us tribes come together and discuss these big issues and work on them together — I feel like it has shifted my perspective and I can see a difference,” said Ms. Richards, 34, a peer support specialist based in Palmer.Beyond national representation, Indigenous organizations are urging participation in state elections as they fight to maintain gaming rights as a crucial part of their economy. Communities are also working to keep salmon from going extinct in the Columbia River Basin in the Pacific Northwest.Preservation of natural resources has been particularly acute in Alaska, where attendees at the convention cheered for Ms. Peltola’s emphasis on a “pro-fish” platform and others spoke about how they had become more involved in the push for better subsistence fishing in their regions.“We’re fighting for our salmon, we’re fighting for our food — that’s our way of life,” said Faye Ewan, 68, who lives in the Native Village of Kluti-Kaah and is a longtime champion for Indigenous sovereignty over fishing. “It’s sacred.”But like other elders, she said she had seen a change in the organizing and impact of Indigenous voters.“The younger generation is more educated and more aware of the policies,” Ms. Ewan said. More

    More stories

    • 125 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Melanie Stansbury, a Democrat, Cruises in New Mexico House Race

      by

      Ms. Stansbury won a landslide victory in a special election to fill the seat vacated by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. The result is likely to hearten national Democrats worried about the 2022 midterms.Melanie Stansbury, a Democrat, won a landslide victory in a special House election in New Mexico on Tuesday, claiming the seat previously held by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and easily turning back a Republican effort to make the race a referendum on rising crime in the Albuquerque-based district.Late Tuesday night, Ms. Stansbury, a state representative, had captured 62 percent of the vote, while her Republican rival, Mark Moores, had won 34 percent.Her dominating performance represented an early vote of confidence in the Democratic-controlled White House and Congress in a heavily Hispanic district and could quiet some anxiety in the party about its prospects going into the 2022 midterm elections.An environmental policy expert who has worked as a congressional and White House aide, Ms. Stansbury emphasized economic fairness, the urgency of addressing climate change and the importance of Democrats’ retaining their four-seat House majority.Mr. Moores, a state senator, ran almost entirely on crime and related issues. He assailed Ms. Stansbury for endorsing a bill in Congress that would shift money away from police departments, noting that there have been twice as many murders in Albuquerque this year as there were at this point in 2020.Ms. Stansbury’s victory illustrates that the crime issue alone is insufficient for Republicans to win on in Democratic-leaning districts, at least when their candidates receive little financial help from the national party, as was the case with Mr. Moores.Special elections in the first year after a president is newly elected can often carry grim tidings for the party in control of the White House. And with few such contests this year taking place on even remotely competitive terrain, Democrats moved aggressively to ensure that they were not caught by surprise in New Mexico.Ms. Stansbury enjoyed a commanding financial advantage while benefiting from the Democratic tilt of the district, the First Congressional, which President Biden carried by 23 percentage points last year.She also moved to rebut Mr. Moores’s line of attack, broadcasting a commercial that featured a retired sheriff’s deputy and trumpeted her work in the Legislature bringing state dollars for law enforcement back to Albuquerque.Washington-based Republicans, determining that the heavily urban seat was out of reach, did little to help Mr. Moores. Conversely, national Democrats flooded Ms. Stansbury with assistance.Mark Moores speaking in Albuquerque in May. National Republicans did little to help his campaign financially. Sharon Chischilly for The New York TimesGuarding their thin House majority and fearing the political echo of a loss, or narrow victory, in a race centered on law and order, Washington Democrats dispatched Jill Biden, the first lady, and Doug Emhoff, the second gentleman, to appear with Ms. Stansbury in Albuquerque.House Democrats and their allies in the nation’s capital also showered their nominee in New Mexico with an infusion of money in the final weeks of the race, enabling her to overwhelm Mr. Moores on the television airwaves.Ms. Stansbury raised nearly $1.2 million in the last reporting period, from April 1 to May 12, while Mr. Moores brought in just $344,000 in the same period.Mr. Moores made little attempt to hide his frustration at the lack of national assistance, but congressional Republicans said it would have been a waste of resources to spend significant money in a district that has been held by a Democrat since 2009.In dismissing the race, though, Republicans ceded an opportunity to test just how politically potent the crime issue may prove in the midterm elections next year. With violence dominating the daily headlines in the district, Mr. Moores sought to capitalize on Ms. Stansbury’s support for a little-known bill that would, among other provisions, cut funding to local police departments.She declined to say she regretted supporting the bill, but she largely avoided discussing the subject on the stump, even as she aired the ad emphasizing her efforts to secure funding for law enforcement.After House Democrats were shut out entirely from the runoff in a Republican-tilting special House election in Texas, the New Mexico results were welcome for the party.Representative Sean Patrick Maloney of New York, the chairman of the caucus’s campaign arm, traveled to Albuquerque on Tuesday to join the celebration and to claim a share of credit for retaining Ms. Haaland’s seat.“New Mexico voters chose a leader with the grit and determination to deliver results and rejected the tired Republican tactics of lies and fear-mongering,” Mr. Maloney said after Ms. Stansbury’s victory. More

    • 200 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Why a New Mexico House Race Is a Crucial Test of the G.O.P. Focus on Crime

      by

      In a special election to replace Deb Haaland, Democrats are bolstering their nominee, taking no chances that a law-and-order argument against her will cost them what should be a safe House seat.ALBUQUERQUE — In theory, the special election to fill Interior Secretary Deb Haaland’s seat in the House should not be competitive. President Biden carried the Albuquerque-based district by 23 points last year, and there has not been a close race for Congress here since George W. Bush was president.Democrats in Washington and New Mexico, however, are not taking any chances ahead of the election Tuesday. They have flooded Melanie Stansbury, their nominee, with an infusion of late money, dispatched Jill Biden and Doug Emhoff to appear with her in the state, and sought to energize volunteers on her behalf.“This race is the highest priority for us,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told nearly a thousand national progressive activists on a conference call Thursday night, adding: “Any victory is good, but we want a nice, decisive victory.”Ms. Pelosi’s eagerness to notch a resounding win reflects the party’s anxiety over one of the most pressing challenges it faces: defusing Republican attacks over law and order.More immediately, it signals the urgency House Democrats feel to maintain their tissue-thin majority in the House. With only a four-seat advantage and a largely unified Republican opposition, Ms. Pelosi needs every vote.The contest between Ms. Stansbury and her opponent Mark Moores, both state legislators, carries symbolic as well as practical implications. Special congressional elections in the first year of a new administration have historically offered insight on the strength of the party in power. And this race may prove to be one of the few competitive elections to fill a vacancy ahead of next year’s midterms.Further, with a number of House Democrats already retiring or running for another office, a surprise loss or even a close victory in New Mexico could accelerate the race to the exits among lawmakers who have little appetite to face a difficult re-election only to serve in the minority.Most of the attention on Ms. Haaland’s seat, however, has focused on a central issue in the race: crime. Mr. Moores, a former University of New Mexico football player who now runs a medical diagnostic testing business, has effectively run a one-note campaign against Ms. Stansbury, an environmental consultant who did stints on Capitol Hill and in former President Barack Obama’s Office of Management and Budget.Mr. Moores has spotlighted the rising murder rate in Albuquerque and assailed Ms. Stansbury as soft on crime for supporting a little-known proposal in Congress that would cut funding for local police departments.“We’ve been talking about that a lot because there’s a lot of bad things in that bill that will make New Mexico more dangerous,” he said in an interview, noting there were already nearly 50 murders in Albuquerque so far this year, double the number in the same time frame last year.At a moment when crime is soaring nationally, any success Republicans have with a law-and-order argument here will embolden them to lash Democrats next year with the “defund the police” calls from some on the party’s left.Senior party officials acknowledge that Ms. Stansbury has handed Mr. Moores a political weapon, and complicated an otherwise sleepy race, by coming out for a measure that has little support in Congress and would almost certainly never come to a vote.In an interview, Ms. Stansbury offered no regrets for her support of the measure, the so-called BREATHE Act, an expansive criminal justice proposal pushed by racial justice activists.“Our country is facing a major reckoning and having a major conversation about racial and social injustice, and I think it’s really critical that we address these issues and we have the conversation,” she said.Ms. Stansbury said she had “helped to bring home tens of millions of dollars of public safety funding back to Albuquerque” through her work in the statehouse.She is trumpeting that achievement in a well-aired advertisement aimed at rebutting Mr. Moores’s charges.Mark Moores, the Republican nominee, has focused almost solely on the issue of crime in his campaign.Sharon Chischilly for The New York TimesYet in a series of speeches to supporters two Saturdays ago, Ms. Stansbury avoided mentioning crime or her work to deliver state dollars to local police. She mostly stuck to platitudes about the community, leaning heavily on the jargon of upscale progressives.The election is about “making sure that New Mexico voices are heard in Congress, that everybody has a seat at the table, that our families are taken care of and that people feel empowered,” Ms. Stansbury told a group of voters before a canvassing drive.Some of her supporters, however, were less reluctant to discuss the violence dominating headlines in this city.“That’s what people care about,” said Vera Watson, a Democratic activist who has been canvassing for Ms. Stansbury, noting that almost everybody on her block has had their house burglarized.Scott Carreathers, the city of Albuquerque’s African-American liaison, said “crime is huge, obviously,” but did not know whether that was part of Ms. Stansbury’s platform.Mr. Carreathers called Mr. Moores an “attractive candidate” and, alluding to the traditionally liberal nature of the district, added: “I just don’t want Democrats to take that for granted.”Representative Sean Patrick Maloney of New York, who runs the House Democratic campaign arm, said suggesting his party is seeking to defund the police is “a pernicious lie.” But Mr. Maloney also authored a review of last year’s elections that highlighted that line of attack as one of the main reasons Democrats nearly lost the House, so he knows well the potency of the charge.What’s working in the Democrats’ favor is that while they have raced to prop up Ms. Stansbury’s campaign with money and reinforcements, out-of-state Republicans have all but abandoned Mr. Moores. Concluding that the heavily urban seat is unwinnable, House Republicans have sent him just $7,000. Ms. Stansbury has been showered with more than $100,000 just from congressional Democrats, enabling her to dramatically outspend Mr. Moores in the final weeks of the race.And with no outside Republican groups broadcasting commercials in the district, Ms. Stansbury has dominated the Albuquerque airwaves.“Yeah the money hasn’t come in like I would’ve liked,” said Mr. Moores. He said Washington Republicans had told him he “had to make this a race” to receive their help.Like other Republicans running in liberal-leaning areas, he has also had to tread gingerly around former President Donald J. Trump’s false claims that last year’s presidential election was stolen.Asked if Mr. Trump was still the leader of the G.O.P., Mr. Moores sighed, paused for a few seconds and said: “I think there’s a lot of leaders of the party.” He acknowledged Mr. Biden had won the election fairly. “We as a nation have to move on,” he said.The partisan composition of early voting returns suggests Ms. Stansbury is well-positioned going into the election on Tuesday: As of May 27, more than twice as many registered Democrats had cast ballots as registered Republicans, according to The Albuquerque Journal.The ballots cast only represent 15 percent of registered voters, though, and it’s unclear if Republicans will show up in larger numbers on the day of the vote, immediately after a holiday weekend.State and national Democrats are confident Ms. Stansbury will prevail, and say her lack of name recognition — she was only elected to the state legislature in 2018 — and a somewhat apathetic electorate are the only things injecting a measure of uncertainty into the race.“People are just exhausted from the election in November,” said State Representative Antonio Maestas, an Albuquerque Democrat. “Political junkies don’t understand that not everybody is a political junkie, so we have to remind our friends and family there’s an election.”After the party’s challenges with some Hispanic voters last year, Democrats have been pleasantly surprised that Mr. Moores, whose mother is a Latina, has not emphasized his ethnicity to contrast himself with Ms. Stansbury, who is white, in a district that’s 43 percent Hispanic.Still, they are working assiduously to avoid an unpleasant surprise on Tuesday. A number of New Mexico-based Democratic operatives with ties to the national party reached out to their contacts in Washington to ensure them that they took the race seriously.And Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat who represented the district before becoming governor, has spoken to her former colleagues in the Congressional Hispanic Caucus about the contest, according to people familiar with the conversations. On Saturday, Ms. Lujan Grisham and Ms. Stansbury were joined in Albuquerque by Representative Pete Aguilar of California, a member of the Democratic leadership.Representative Cheri Bustos of Illinois, who ran the House Democratic campaign arm in 2020, said there was an aggressive push in the caucus to help Ms. Stansbury.“The initial reaction is, ‘That’s a safe Democratic seat, right, why is everybody asking for money?’” Ms. Bustos said. “But I think everybody wants to be sure.”Ms. Stansbury said she had spoken to Ms. Pelosi about the stakes.“Everyone in Democratic leadership, from the House to the White House to our own Democratic leadership, know how important this race is — everything is on the line in terms of the House majority,” she said. More

    • 100 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Deb Haaland Makes History, and Dresses for It

      by

      When she took her oath of office, the first Native American cabinet secretary also took a stance for self-expression.Forget pantsuit nation. The Washington dress code is changing, one swearing-in at a time.On Thursday, Deb Haaland made history when she began her job as Secretary of the Interior, becoming the first Native American member of the cabinet. And she did so not in the recent uniform of many female politirati — the fruit bowl-colored trouser suit — but rather in traditional Indigenous dress.Standing in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to Vice President Kamala Harris to take the oath of office, Ms. Haaland wore a dark jacket over a sky blue, rainbow-trimmed ribbon skirt embroidered with imagery of butterflies, stars and corn; moccasin boots; a turquoise and silver belt and necklace; and dragonfly earrings.Against the flags and dark wood, the former Democratic congresswoman from New Mexico stood out, her clothes telegraphing a statement of celebration and of self at a ceremonial moment that will be preserved for the record. It was symbolic in more ways than one.According to an Instagram post from Reecreeations, that company that made the skirt for Ms. Haaland’s swearing-in, the ribbon skirt is a reminder of “matriarchal power”: “Wearing it in this day and age is an act of self empowerment and reclamation of who we are and that gives us the opportunity to proudly make bold statements in front of others who sometimes refuse to see us. It allows us to be our authentic selves unapologetically.”This is yet another break from the four years of the Trump administration, when the West Wing aesthetic could best be described as “Fox wardrobe department, the D.C. version.” Think primary-colored sheath or wrap dress, high heels, Breck hair and lots of false eyelashes.And more broadly, it’s a break from the prevailing wisdom regarding female dress in the corridors of power, which dictated safety in a dark suit — with maybe the occasional red jacket for pop. The point being to look like the (male) majority that ruled; to be a company woman and play the part of the institution. Not any more.In 2019, when Ms. Haaland was sworn in as a congresswoman representing New Mexico, she also chose native dress, including a red woven belt more than a century old. Joshua Roberts/ReutersWearing traditional dress has become something of a signature for Ms. Haaland during big public moments. In 2016, she wore a classic Pueblo dress and jewelry to the Democratic National Convention; in 2019, when she was sworn in as one of the first Native American members of Congress, she did the same, including a red woven belt that was more than a century old. And in January, at President Biden’s inauguration, she also wore a ribbon skirt, one in sunshine yellow, with a burgundy top and boots.As she told Emily’s List on her first day in Congress: “I just felt like I should represent my people. I thought it would just make some folks proud out there.”Indeed, when Ms. Haaland posted a photo of herself at the inauguration on her Instagram feed (she has 124,000 followers), it was liked more than 45,000 times, with many comments applauding her attire. Not in order to diminish her achievements, the charge often leveled at commentary on a female politician’s wardrobe choices, but to underscore them.Similarly, after a video taken by her daughter of Ms. Haaland getting ready for her swearing-in began to circulate online Thursday, users cheered. “Ribbon skirt, moccasins, hair down — Deb Haaland inviting all the ancestors to her swearing in ceremony,” tweeted one user.Sherrilyn Ifill, the president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, called it “my spiritual lift for the day.”Ms. Haaland is not the first or only female politician to use dress to express identity at moments of guaranteed public scrutiny, but she is part of a new generation of women in Washington that is increasingly, and intentionally, individual in their choices.Rashida Tlaib, the Democratic congresswoman from Michigan, for example, wore a traditional Palestinian thobe to her swearing-in, and Ilhan Omar, the Democratic representative from Minnesota, became the first woman to wear a hijab in Congress when she was elected in 2019.And though Vice President Harris has largely adopted what seems like a sea of dark trouser suits for her everyday work life, the fashion choices she made during the inauguration, focused on the work of young, independent designers of color, suggest that she is more than aware of the way carefully calibrated imagery can resonate with viewer — and is more than ready to deploy that tool with calculated precision.As Ms. Harris said after Ms. Haaland was sworn in, “History is being made yet again.” It’s only fitting to dress for it. More