NCCPR news and commentary roundup, week ending Oct. 29

● At long last, the United States has officially apologized for 150 years of trying to use “child welfare” and children’s “best interests” to eradicate Native America. You can watch President Biden issue the apology here.

● The Imprint has the reaction of tribal leaders, who praised the apology but noted that the words must be followed by action. The story cites, among others, Jonathan W. Smith, Sr., chairman of the Tribal Council for the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation of Oregon: 

“The true measure of these words will be in the actions that come from them,” he said. “We look forward to working together on concrete commitments that demonstrate a genuine redress of this deliberate pain.” 

Indeed, Native Americans continue to be torn from their homes at far higher rates than their rate in the general population, and there are constant efforts by defenders of family policing to undermine the law meant to curb such needless removal -- the Indian Child Welfare Act. 

And see this reminder from Kevin Campbell, CEO and Co-Founder of Pale Blue: 

The First People of Australia say today, 16 years after the apology by Prime Minister Rudd, “Sorry means you don't do it again”, as indigenous children are being taken a record rates. What will be said in America 16 years from today?

— Kevin Campbell (@familyfinders) October 25, 2024

● Even the boarding schools that were the heart of the original systematic plan to use child welfare to eradicate Native America have not entirely gone away.  Seven modern versions still exist.  While they are not the torture chambers of old, Lee Enterprises newspapers report that at least two of them allegedly are the scene of other forms of abuse – sexual assault and the misuse and overuse of psychiatric medication. 

● For those who want to use ICWA to defend Native American children, there are new online resources.

 In other news:

● As you read this New York Times story about children still traumatized years after they were torn from their parents at the Mexican border during the Trump Administration, please remember: When children are torn from their parents by U.S. family police agencies, their motives may be different, but the trauma is the same.

● The Colorado Trust reports on the way housing isn’t just the reason for so many needless removals of children from their families, it’s also the trigger for so many of those “other reasons” family police agencies love to talk about to divert attention from the confusion of poverty with “neglect” … 

● … while the Santa Fe New Mexican reports that the New Mexico Supreme Court has curbed the ability of that state’s family police agency to confuse poverty with neglect. 

● For decades, as the massive American child welfare surveillance state grew, the response to anyone who objected was: “We have to do this, children are dying!  You don’t care if children die!”  So the surveillance state grew – and children kept right on dying. 

Two of the nation’s leading supporters of a take-the-child-and-run approach to family policing have refined the claim.  Now they claim we don’t want to talk about fatalities.  On the contrary, as I explain in this column for The Imprint, we talk about fatalities all the time – the take-the-child-and-run crowd just doesn’t like what we have to say. 

● There’s a child welfare angle to the controversy over owners of The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times killing editorials endorsing Kamala Harris.  One of those who resigned from the Times editorial board in protest is Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial writer Robert Greene.  He understood “child welfare” issues better – and sooner – than any other mainstream editorial writer I know.  He did the right thing, of course, but it’s still a big loss.  I wrote about him here.  

In this week’s edition of The Horror Stories go in All Directions: 

● There is no indication anyone accused the parents of one-year-old Nova Bryant of beating her, or starving her, or torturing her.  Instead, according to WRTV in Indianapolis 

Bryant relied on a feeding tube and [her mother, Celena] Conkright has disorders, including ADHD and ADD.  Conkright said DCS removed Bryant from her care two months after she was born.  “They said I wasn’t capable of taking care of her, they said I wasn’t learning fast enough,” Conkright said.

Here’s what happened in the last of the three foster homes in which Bryant was placed:

 The Indiana Department of Child Services is taking action to revoke a Brazil woman’s foster license after the drowning death of her 1-year-old foster daughter, Nova Bryant.

 Bryant's foster mother, Hailynn Volpatti, is charged with Neglect of a Dependent Resulting in Death, a level 1 felony.  Volpatti pleaded not guilty Friday and her jury trial is scheduled for April 15.