Native American women and girls face violence at disproportionally and devastatingly high rates in the US. According to Futures Without Violence, “American Indian women residing on Indian reservations suffer domestic violence and physical assault at rates far exceeding women of other ethnicities and locations. A 2004 Department of Justice report estimates these assault rates to be as much as 50% higher than the next most victimized demographic.” There are multiple factors contributing to this, including poverty, historical victimization, and the normalization of violence. European settlers introduced patriarchal values, disease, guns, alcohol, and Christianity to North America, changing the landscape literally and figuratively.

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In the United States, more than half of all Native women are raped in their lifetime, per the CDC. In Montana, Native people are “four times more likely to go missing, comprising over a quarter (25.5%) of missing persons, but are only 6.6% of the state population; 60% of missing [Native people] in Montana are women.” This information was collected by the Montana DOJ and the NCAI Policy Research Center. According to the National Congress of American Indians, “84.3% of [Native] women (more than 4 in 5) have experienced intimate partner violence, sexual violence, or stalking in their lifetimes."

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There are few resources for these crimes. Native women who experience violence also face discrimination in the legal system and when seeking medical care. According to Futures Without Violence, “the barriers of social isolation precludes some American Indian and Alaska Native women from obtaining adequate medical care including the availability of rape kits being preformed by trained medical staff to aid in prosecution.” The next steps are no better: according to the Indian Law Resource Center, “Federal and state officials having authority to protect Native women and girls are failing to do so at alarming rates. By their own account, between 2005 and 2009, U.S. attorneys declined to prosecute 67% of the Indian country matters referred to them involving sexual abuse and related matters. Even grimmer, due to the lack of law enforcement, many of these crimes in Native communities are not even investigated.” This is unacceptable.

 

To learn more about sexual violence against Native women and girls, please read this study published by Amnesty International: The Never-Ending Maze: Continued Failure to Protect Indigenous Women from Sexual Violence in the USA.

 

We affirm this statement by the Indian Law Resource Center: “All this highlights the United States’ failure not only under its own law, including the trust responsibility to Indian nations, but also its obligations under international human rights law such as the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Perhaps the most basic human right recognized under international law is the right to be free of violence.”

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We believe that every person has the right to be safe. We recognize the history and present context of domestic and sexual violence against Native Americans, and we created the action plan below so that all the people we serve can access safety, independence, and empowerment. However, these are only the first steps. We are committed to the long fight for justice in all forms.