Rep. Condemns MAGA-Clad Students Filmed Mocking Native American Man
Rep. Deb Haaland (D-NM) on Saturday condemned students shown in a video mocking and yelling at a Native American man at the first annual Indigenous Peoples March the previous day.
Haaland and Rep. Sharice Davids (D-KS) became the first Native American congresswomen in American history when they were sworn in earlier this month.
Indian Country Today
identified the man in the video as Nathan Phillips, an Omaha elder and Vietnam War Veteran. The website said of Phillips: “He is also a keeper of a sacred pipe and holds an annual ceremony honoring Native American veterans in the Arlington National Cemetery.”
At one point in the footage, a woman tells the students: “You guys are acting like a mob, that’s what’s going on. Fucking mob mentality. It’s awesome, because you guys are what, like 16? How old are you?”
Some of the students mocking Phillips in the video are wearing Trump campaign apparel. Others are wearing Covington Catholic High School gear.
TPM’s request for comment to the Kentucky school’s principal and assistant principals has gone unanswered. A
school calendar for Covington Catholic shows that students were planning on being in Washington, D.C. on Jan. 18 and 19 for the March for Life, an anti-abortion event.
Phillips said separately that he heard the students chanting “Build that wall!” \
“This is indigenous land,” he said. “We’re not supposed to have walls here. We never did.”
