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Brian Lehrer: From WNYC in New York, it's America, Are We Ready? A Thursday night national call-in show for the first 100 days of the Biden presidency. This is day 44. This afternoon, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee approved one of Biden's most controversial and most historic nominees, Congresswoman Deb Haaland to become the Interior Secretary. Controversial because of her anti-fossil fuels beliefs in a job that oversees federal lands where oil and gas drilling take place. Historic because if confirmed by the full Senate, she will become the first Native American cabinet secretary in US history, and the Interior Department also oversees tribal lands.

America, are we ready for a new federal relationship with the people who lived here first and the lands they still live on? Special guests and your calls after the news.

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From WNYC Radio, with studios located on Munsee Lenape territory, also known as Lower Manhattan in New York City, it's America, Are We Ready? A Thursday night national call-in show for the first 100 days of the Biden presidency. This is day 44. The music behind me is from the new album called, I Pray For My Enemies. It's by the US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo, who happens to be Native American, a member of the Muscogee Nation.

We'll talk to her in just a minute as the first guest on tonight's show, then later, we'll cover the news today that Congresswoman Deb Haaland of New Mexico is pretty much assured now of becoming the first Native American cabinet secretary in US history as her nomination to be Interior Secretary got out of committee, and with two Republican votes this afternoon. We'll take your calls later too on President Biden's promise to change the federal relationship with Native tribes, but hold off on the calls for now. We'll give out the number in a few minutes after we spend a few minutes with US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo, the first Native American to serve in that position. She was appointed to it in 2019. Joy, it is always a joy to speak with you. Thank you for joining us on America, Are We Ready?

Joy Harjo: Thank you so much for having me on again. Nice to be here.

Brian: Just to talk about the track that we were listening to, I read that you didn't start learning the saxophone until you were around 40. Is that right, and what inspired you to take it up relatively late in life to start learning an instrument?

Joy Harjo: Yes, most people don't do that, and I always loved the sound of the saxophone. When I was in junior high, I wanted to play sax, and the band teacher wouldn't let girls play sax, so I walked away from music. I picked it up again, I like the sound of the voice, and I've always loved jazz as well as many other kinds of music.

Brian: We'll sample from a part of that song that has your lyrics coming up later in the segment. Can you talk about the title of both the track and the album, which sounds like something Joe Biden might say, actually, I Pray For My Enemies.

Joy Harjo: Yes, I could be pretty loaded. That's the name of the album, I Pray For My Enemies. It comes from a poem called This Morning, I Pray For My Enemies, about one of those moments when you go out and you're upset. The poem goes, "The door to the mind should only open from the heart." It's really about-- Prayer is-- I think of every moment can be everything we say or speak, or John Coltrane, the saxophone player extraordinaire who often spoke about how his music was essentially a prayer. The whole album or the music and the poem has to do with, "Wait a minute, we're all in this together." That you might be standing across from me, but we're all standing here. We're all here on earth. We're standing all together in a circle, literally, in a circle, a circle or a globe called the earth.

Brian: In your track-by-track notes for the album, you write, "Ultimately, we are one person, which is what COVID taught us or is teaching us." What do you mean 'one person' in that context of COVID?

Joy Harjo: I don't know if you remember about-- When that image NASA released of the earth as a being, a beautiful blue and green being that looked like it was breathing, there it is. There's the larger context. You look, and it's one person, and we all have a part, we all have a part of this story in this place, and you cannot-- From that context, from that worldview, we are one person.

Brian: You're right. Our differences give life [unintelligible 00:05:12] story. We, in all our diversity, are one. It's very American in a certain way, very E pluribus unum to see diversity as unifying rather than dividing. People so often see it as divisive these days. Can you elaborate on that line from your notes?

Joy Harjo: Yes. Ultimately, it is-- Let's see-- Ask me that again. I was trying to find another way into it.

Brian: Just the idea of the beautiful line that you wrote of, "We, in all our diversity, are one," so the diversity, how the diversity unites people.

Joy Harjo: Yes, because-- I mean, think about it. I remember once when I was about in 6th grade and I decided-- I had a whole box of crayons in different colors, and I thought, "This is so cool, I'm going to melt them all together and see what color it makes." I melted them down and watched as they melted, and they turned into a big clump of gray, but individually, they were all different colors. Then when I kept going and learned color theory, and there's oppositions-- There's people that compliment us, there's other people that are oppositional, and often, it's those moments and those people who are oppositional who have the most to teach us.

Brian: Now, people who don't know you can already tell from this conversation, I think, that you're a very spiritual person, and in touch with nature. Some of the other song titles on the album are Calling the Spirit Back, Why is Beauty, One Day there will be Horses, and How Love Blows Through the Trees. I'm curious, are you also political in a way that would allow you to say what your hopes and dreams are for a presidency that wants to be responsive to Native American concerns, or can't a Poet Laureate do that?

Joy Harjo: Well, I think I had many great teachers and mentors coming up as a poet and a musician, and every one of them in some way or the other made the statement that there's no separation between the personal and the political. Somebody-- Who was it that said, "You can't play it-- It won't come out of your horn," is that Miles Davis? That it won't come out of your horn unless you've lived it. Of course, we're living-- Everything is political. Every field has terrible politics, so yes, there's-- I think what I've learned is that, one, the stories don't change that much. The details might change through the years, but it's often the same kinds of themes that keep coming up over and over.

Sometimes it gets despairing, like watching all of this come down this summer, the divisiveness and the racial hatred. When in my generation, I guess we thought we had at least made inroads, and then we watch-- Here we are again, watching the same issues playing out in the story field, in the contemporary American story field over and over again, and yet there's still-- There's changes made, there's little moments of miracles where people connect [unintelligible 00:09:02] and people open.

Brian: Joy, you might've heard that I opened with what's known as an Indigenous land acknowledgment, saying that our studios are located in Munsee Lenape territory, also known as Lower Manhattan. That's happening more frequently these days in some media, like the public radio show On Being does that, and elsewhere in the arts. Do you find the land acknowledgments meaningful?

Joy Harjo: They can be. I had to do an opening for an event yesterday, and I did probably about half of it talking about really what a land acknowledgment is. It's a moment of respect saying, "This is where we are, we're all here together." Like right now, we're here together. I'm in the Muscogee Creek Nation in Tulsa, you're there in the Lenape area, and there's listeners all over, but here we are in this moment, so let's just take a moment to remember respectfully that we are on these incredible lands that give us everything, and that part of the story--

The original keepers of these lands are Indigenous peoples, and we're still here. We still are charged with keeping these lands, with making sure that there's balance on these lands. That's how I see a land acknowledgment, to acknowledge that-- Because in the predominant story of America, in the predominant contemporary culture of America, you'd never see Natives, we are not visible. We might be standing right next to you or eating lunch next to you, and we're not visible. There is a guitar player, Larry Mitchell, I played with off and on for years. He grew up in Bed-Stuy, and he said when he was going to school, they said in his classroom that the Indians had all been killed, that there were no Natives anymore.

Brian: And so he didn't know. I guess that's one of the things that you bring to the country by being the first Native American Poet Laureate.

Joy Harjo: Yes, it is. It certainly-- It opened that door of awareness as to say, "Wait a minute, there are Natives here, and there's Native poets, and it looks like we're going to have the first secretary of interior as a Native woman." How amazing is that?

Brian: We're going to be talking a lot about Deb Haaland with our next guest and our callers coming up in just a minute. What would that mean to you, briefly?

Joy Harjo: It's quite amazing. I've known Deb for some time. She was my poetry student, most people don't know that.

Brian: Oh, wow.

Joy Harjo: Yes. When I was teaching at one point-- Every once in a while, I'll take a teaching gig, and then I let it go because I'm too busy with my other work. She came in, I remember she came into my office carrying a motorcycle helmet, and asked to be let into my creative writing class, creative writing poetry. I had room, I said, "Sure." She was a very good student, and even worked for me briefly as an assistant. I came to-- She always had what she had in mind, and here she was with--

Brian: 10 seconds--

Joy Harjo: Okay-- Is that, she was always concerned about conservation, about people, about the preservation--

Brian: We will definitely talk about all of those coming right up, and listeners, after the break, we'll talk about the nomination of Deb Haaland being approved by a Senate committee today, and what it might mean for the environment, public lands, jobs in the fossil fuel industries, and Native American quality of life if she does become fully confirmed. As we say goodbye to US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo-- Joy, thank you so much, we'll go out with a little bit of that title track from her new album, I Pray For My Enemies.

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Brian: From WNYC in New York, this is America, Are we ready? A Thursday night national call-in show for the first 100 days of the Biden presidency here on day 44. I'm Brian Lehrer, and tonight, it's America, are we ready for a new relationship between the United States government and the people who lived here first and the lands they still live on? With today's vote in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, we are headed toward having our first ever Native American cabinet secretary, Deb Haaland. She is currently a member of Congress, and a Native American first in that position too. Two Native American women were elected as the first Native Americans ever in Congress in 2018. She's from New Mexico. This is part of what Biden promises will be a long-overdue corrective.

President Biden: The Federal Government has long broken promises to Native American tribes who've been on this land since time immemorial. With her appointment, Congresswoman Haaland will help me strengthen the nation to nation relationship.

Brian: Listeners, now I'll open up the phones on a few questions related to the Deb Haaland nomination. If you are from any Native American tribal nation, you'll get first priority for the rest of this hour. What would it take for President Biden to keep that promise of strengthening what he called there, the nation-to-nation relationship, and what do you want from the Biden administration to improve Native American quality of life? Our number is 844-745-TALK. That's 844-745-8255.

Again, if you are from any Native American tribal nation, you will get first priority this hour. What do you want from the Biden presidency to improve Native American quality of life and strengthen the nation-to-nation relationship? Our number is 844-745-TALK. We'll also get into questions of fossil fuel drilling, something that currently employs a lot of people, including on Native lands, and that President Biden has put a moratorium on, at least for new drilling leases on purely federal lands. Deb Haaland's nomination was controversial in part because she supports that moratorium, so listeners, you can call on that too from any side of that issue at 844-745-TALK, 844-745-8255.

With me now, as your calls are coming in, is Julian Brave NoiseCat, vice-president of policy and strategy with the progressive think tank Data for Progress. He's the narrative change director of the Natural History Museum, an artist and activist collective that is, and a fellow at the Type Media Center NDN Collective, and the Center for Humans and Nature. He also wrote a Washington Post op-ed last month called Why Senate Republicans Fear Deb Haaland. Julian, nice to talk to you again. Welcome to America, Are We Ready?

Julian Brave NoiseCat: Thanks so much for having me, Brian. [unintelligible 00:17:02]

Brian: I see that when I search for you on Twitter, Julian, the first thing that comes up is #DebForInterior, so this nomination matters to you. Tell us why.

Julian Brave NoiseCat: I think to understand why this nomination is so important for me, for Native people across the country, and also, I think for our nation's history, you have to really understand what the Interior Department is and what it has done historically to Native people. The third Interior Secretary, a guy named Alexander Stuart, once described his mission and the United States' mission as, "To civilize or exterminate Native people."

In many ways, the Interior Department was core to that mission throughout the United States' history, whether we're talking about the Dawes Act in the late 1800s which took millions of acres of land from Native nations, the boarding schools that took Native children away to assimilate them, and often, to quite literally beat their language and culture out of them, or the Termination Era in the mid-1900s when the United States' stated policy towards Native nations was literally termination, was to legally revoke our sovereign status.

Against that history, Deb Haaland is obviously the first Native American to be nominated to be the Interior Secretary. She's actually even the first Native American to ever be chosen for a presidential cabinet. When she showed up for her Senate confirmation hearing last week, last Tuesday, she introduced herself in her family's language, the Keres language, it's a Pueblo language, and also acknowledged that the hearing was taking place on the homelands of the Piscataway people here in what is now Washington DC.

I think that just that deep and painful history juxtaposed with that pride in the fact that Stuart and the countless other bureaucrats and government officials who tried to carry out that mission of Indigenous annihilation failed, I think is just a very powerful statement of what this nomination means and what Deb Haaland means to Native people, and also to the United States as a whole.

Brian: I have a few clips from Congresswoman Haaland's confirmation hearing. You wrote about some of these in your Washington Post op-ed. Here's 16 seconds of Haaland responding to a question from Republican Senator Jim Risch of Idaho about why she supports President Biden's suspension of the Keystone XL Pipeline from Canada.

Congresswoman Haaland: One of the reasons why is that I support President Biden. I think he's thought deeply about these things, and I think that he cares deeply about our environment, and I do as well.

Brian: That's one, and here's Congresswoman Haaland responding to a question on why she supports the president's moratorium on new oil and gas drilling leases on federal lands.

Congresswoman Haaland: Senator, it's my understanding that there is only a pause on the new leases for the new gas and oil leases. Currently, the existing valid leases are moving forward, permitting is moving forward, I understand that. I know that the department currently is moving those permits forward. I don't know all the particulars of every permit that's been signed, but I know that President Biden isn't looking to shut everything down. The existing permits and leases will continue.

Senator 2: Yes, but no new ones.

Congresswoman Haaland: There is a pause on the new ones.

Brian: Julian, I'm going to get your take on those clips in a minute, but I want to go to our first caller first, and it is Sunny in Deb Haaland's state, New Mexico. Hi, Sunny, you're on America, Are We Ready?

Sunny: Good evening [unintelligible 00:21:10] to all of you who are listening. It's a privilege and an honor to know that the Department of Interior is going to be represented, and managed, and organized from the perspective of a Native American, and specifically, a woman. Many Native nations across the North and Southern hemisphere were matrilineal since time immemorial, and I think this is a perfect opportunity to finally hear the Native voice, because we have been here forever, but we're always left out of the vital conversations regarding equity, and equality, and all of those kinds of things.

I did meet Congresswoman Haaland before she was political. She's a genuine, absolutely genuinely beautiful individual that is spiritually grounded and culturally intact. That's the kind of person that it's going to take for all of the United States to understand that we have got to reconfigure our thought processes regarding earth, land, water, air, all of the elements that give us life and breath.

Brian: Sunny, do you want to say anything about your particular background and what you think a positive set of federal policies could bring to the people who you descend from?

Sunny: Well, I am a member of the Dene Navajo Nation in the Four Corners Region of the United States, and we have been devastated by the pandemic and COVID, and we are doing our best to survive. 135,000 members of our nation have been vaccinated, so I'm really, really glad about that. There's no real apprehension about being vaccinated, and that's going to give us the opportunity to survive, because I think that the virus all over has exposed every [unintelligible 00:23:52] that exists in the systems that are functioning or not functioning. I think Ms. Haaland's voice in this particular administration is only positive in every regard.

Brian: Thank you so much for your call. I really, really appreciate it. Listeners, 844-745-TALK, 844-745-8255. First priority on the phones, but not only priority, but first priority to anyone else who's from a Native American background and wants to talk about what a new federal relationship nation to nation, as President Biden put it, could be if he keeps his promises. 844-745-TALK, 844-745-8255, as we continue with Julian Brave NoiseCat from Data for Progress-- But let's go to another caller. Domani in Brooklyn, you're on America, Are we ready? Hi, Domani.

Domani: Hi, thank you so much for taking my call. I love your show. I called in because I have both Cherokee and Blackfoot Native blood in my family, and as a child, for a long time, I would always make it a point to say that I had that Native American heritage because there were so few of us. We weren't really talked about, our heritage wasn't studied or taught, and so I thought that it was really important to let people know that we're still here.

I called in because I think that this is an incredible opportunity that Biden has put forward for Ms. Haaland. I really believe that her being in this position not only represents the sensibilities of Mother Earth, how the First People see the planet and our surroundings, and how we are nurturing and have been the caregivers of this great land for hundreds and hundreds of years before anyone ever landed on Plymouth Rock, so to speak.

The fact that we have been so marginalized, here with this great platform, with a wonderful person at the helm to really take care of the interior, I just think it couldn't have been a better time. Obviously, the sooner the better, but I think that if Biden can show his support, and steadfast behind the decisions that she makes, that will show a real commitment to the rekindling of the federal relationship and the Indigenous people of America. Thank you so much.

Brian: Domani, thank you so much for your call. Julian Brave NoiseCat, you want to reflect on those callers we just heard?

Julian Brave NoiseCat: Yes. I think it was really wonderful to hear Sunny speak her Navajo language. I'll give it my best shot and I'll say [unintelligible 00:27:20] for what you said, Sunny. I'm obviously not Dene, but I've picked up a few words here and there in my reporting and travels, and have some relatives in the Indian way, not in the blood relation, but in people who I consider family from the Navajo Nation. It's really great to hear those words. It was also really great to hear from Domani in Brooklyn. I think that you can hear when people, especially Native people talk about this nomination, just how much it means to people just in the sound of their voice.

It's taken over 230 years, almost 230 years for us to get to this point where a Native person would be in the executive in the country that was built on the lands that were taken from us. Obviously, that's far too long, but also, I think that we have so much hope in Secretary-designate Haaland, in the poise that she carried herself in those hearings, and in her commitment. In the fact that she went to the camps in the path of the Dakota Access Pipeline in 2016 and cooked green chili stew and tortillas for water protectors.

I think that both in her words and her actions throughout her life, she's really shown her commitment to our people and to represent it as well, and I think the fact that she's so visible is also going to mean that she's going to be able to show real leadership at Interior. What she does is going to matter because she's the first Native person in the cabinet, and I think that that gives me a great deal of hope that she's going to be able to stick her neck out every once in a while and, do things that need to be done.

Brian: We played those clips of Congresswoman Haaland supporting the Keystone XL Pipeline cancellation by President Biden, and his moratorium on new oil and gas drilling leases on federal lands. Julian, do you see these as important climate issues, Native American issues, or both?

Julian Brave NoiseCat: Certainly both. Obviously, the Keystone XL Pipeline poses a threat to the climate in that it would lock us into a future of emissions when we build new infrastructure for fossil fuels. That means that those energy sources are going to be used far into the future because they are sunk costs, they are sunk investments to those corporations. The fact that that pipeline is not going to be built moves us just a little bit closer to a transition to clean energy, and I think that that, at the end of the day, is a good thing.

I think that we do need to reckon with the fact that there are lots of workers who played a really central role in building this country, in building it on fossil fuels. We need to certainly make sure that we take care of them, and make sure that they can get good [unintelligible 00:30:39] unionized jobs in the sort of energy system of tomorrow. I think that that's a totally important thing.

Then, of course, I think the part about this that is also really exciting to me is that, in our various social movements, whether it'd be the #NoDAPL Movement, the #NoKeystoneXL Movement, before those, the Idle No More Movement, which predominantly arose in Canada in the early 2010s, Native people have been leading the charge for environmental and climate justice. I think that those movements are now reaching some of the highest echelons of governance in this country. What is very exciting to me is the new era that could be emerging here where Native rights, and sovereignty, and governance are seen as not just benefiting Native people, but as benefiting all people through general goods and universal goods like environmental protection.

Brian: Listeners, we'll continue in a minute on America, Are We Ready? We'll take more of your phone calls. Anyone with an interest in the nomination of Deb Haaland to be Interior Secretary, or the land issues we've just been talking about, or anyone with a Native American background of any kind, on what new relationship you hope President Biden brings to your nation or tribe. 844-745-TALK, 844-745-8255, as America, Are We Ready continues.

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Brian: From WNYC in New York, this is America, Are We Ready, a Thursday night national call-in show for the first 100 days of the Biden presidency. Here on day 44, I'm Brian Lehrer. Tonight, it's America, are we ready for a new relationship between the United States government and the people who lived here first, and the land they still live on? Our phones remain open, with first priority this hour for anyone who is a member of a Native American tribe or nation, or anyone with an interest in the nomination of Deb Haaland to be Interior Secretary, or the land use issues we've been talking about that she will oversee. 844-745-TALK, 844-745-8255. Here is Deb Haaland at her confirmation hearing, saying why she wants to be Interior Secretary.

Congresswoman Haaland: One of my dear friends in [unintelligible 00:33:14] Navajo Nation, Albert Shirley, he listens to this hearing on the radio, a radio I bought him that's powered by the sun because he doesn't have electricity. He texted me this morning and said the name-- The Navajo code talkers, the first word they decided to use when they were working on the code was [unintelligible 00:33:40], and that means 'our mother'. That was the code they used for the United States of America.

I feel very strongly that that sums up what we're dealing with. This is all of our country, this is our mother. You've heard the Earth referred to Mother Earth. It's difficult to not feel obligated to protect this land, and I feel that every Indigenous person in this country understands that, which is why we have such a high rate of our people who serve in the military. We want to protect this country.

Brian: Deb Haaland from her confirmation hearing. The Energy and Natural Resources Committee approved her nomination today. Still with us, Julian Brave NoiseCat, vice president of policy and strategy with the progressive think tank Data for Progress, and narrative change director of the Natural History Museum, and author of a Washington Post op-ed last month called Why Senate Republicans Fear Deb Haaland. Let's go back to the phones. Gina in Northfield, Minnesota, you're on America, Are We Ready? Hi, Gina.

Gina: Hi, Brian. How are you? Thank you so much for this. I'm going to just-- I'm a non-Native person, so I'm only going to speak to the question which was, what is it that we would like to see the Biden administration do, especially with Deb Haaland's appointment? I think that the issue that we are concerned with in our state of Minnesota is the Line 3. It's the replacement and expansion of that line that will be moving tar sands out of Canada across Native American treaty lands to one of the great lakes. It is very deeply concerning because of the transit and the desecration of land, and also the potential for environmental damage.

Enbridge is a company out of Canada, not an American corporation. I have been a legal observer during the protests against Line 3, and have observed the scorched earth sacrilege of the land that was once forested and rivered, and all I can say is we hope that the Biden administration will address this issue.

Brian: Gina, thank you very much for weighing in on that. Marian in New York City via Washington State. Mrs. Marian, hi, you're on America, Are We Ready?

Marian Hi. My husband, who is a professional essential worker and at work is [unintelligible 00:36:29] Haida, and I'm sure your guest knows-- His great aunt is Elizabeth Peratrovich, and you know who Elizabeth Peratrovich is, correct?

Julian Brave NoiseCat: Actually, I'm not familiar.

Marian: Well, this speaks to the point of this discussion. Elizabeth Peratrovich was honored by the United States government this year by having the United States Mint strike the latest silver dollar in her honor. Sacagawea is on the reverse for her leadership in attaining the very first anti-discrimination law in the history of the United States in 1945, several years before Brown v. Board, so I would like all your listeners to be aware of the lack of knowledge of that.

I have a number of objections with regard to federal government, Indian Affairs, with Deb Haaland's nomination. The first and most important thing is the very carefully crafted statement by Joe Biden, which you played, Brian, at the very beginning, which was that he said, "The Native peoples have been on this land since time immemorial." That is very carefully crafted, rather than saying Native peoples were on this land. Native peoples were not on this land, that has been a constant theme of the federal government since the federal government expropriated lands from Native people.

With regard to Deb Haaland, Deb Haaland, to my knowledge did not grow up on a reservation. She grew up on a series of military bases, and as Morgan Freeman would say about Barack Obama, Barack Obama is a mixed-race person, as is Deb Haaland, and we unfortunately still have a one-drop rule in the United States. Something that Joe Biden has prided himself on in the rest of his cabinet appointment is that he has chosen career professionals for their expertise in their field and their career service in the federal government in their selection for their cabinet appointments as secretaries. The big problem with the federal government and its history with Native people in the [unintelligible 00:39:24] in every aspect, CIA, Bureau of Land Management, Interior, is politics, and what did he do? He picked a politician.

Brian: Marian, I'm going to leave it there, and I'm going to give Julian Brave NoiseCat a chance to comment on any of that. I think she's a little skeptical of Congresswoman Haaland for being a politician in this admittedly political position of US Interior Secretary that she's headed to, but I think Marian wanted something else.

Julian Brave NoiseCat: I think that it's reasonable for people to be skeptical of politicians, given the state of our politics. I think that there's a couple of things here. Firstly, I think that the truth of the matter is that part of the reason why Congresswoman Haaland is now Secretary-designate Haaland is that she is, in fact, a very effective politician. At the same time, she's a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus who has gotten support of very left groups like the Sunrise Movement and the Justice Democrats, she's also liked by members of the Congressional Republican Caucus.

Don Young from Alaska, no liberal, introduced her at the Senate Energy and Natural Resource Committee hearing last week. I think that that's in large part, a testament to how effective Congresswoman Haaland is at politics. I think that it's reasonable to be skeptical of politics, but I think it's also, in this instance, just a fact that the Congresswoman would not be breaking this barrier for our people if it were not for her savviness and skills as a legislator, as a politician, as a policymaker, all of those things, and of course, people wanted to fight for her. She was not the first and obvious pick for someone like Biden who probably would have been more comfortable going with someone from his inner circle for this role.

For all those reasons, I view her political skillset as an asset. I think that it's also reasonable to reckon with the history of the Interior Department, which as I mentioned at the beginning of this program, has not exactly had a great and friendly relationship to Native people and Native nations, and to ask what the constraints are of the political systems and government institutions that Haaland is stepping into and leading.

At the end of the day, I am hopeful that having someone with her values, with her set of experiences-- She may have grown up as a military brat, but she went to Mesita on the Laguna Pueblo to visit her grandmother a lot when she was a child. They had no running water or electricity at Mesita. She has tended to traditional corn gardens, she cooks for Pueblo Feast Days, she has memories from her childhood of going to various traditional dances that she's shared with me.

In many ways, I think that that experience, maybe perhaps not growing up on the reservation, but certainly, having deep, deep familial ties to it is common to many Native people. 70% of Native people actually live in cities, and I think that that's very representative of her experience. I personally see it as very representative of our experience as it exists today.

Brian: Let's take another caller. Here is a listener calling us, Old Mr. Al from Atlanta. Hello, Old Mr. Al, you're on America, Are We Ready?

Old Mr. Al: How are you doing?

Brian: Pretty well, I hope. And yourself?

Old Mr. Al: Yes, I'm doing very well, and I'm really enjoying your show. I tried to call before, and I thought it was probably pre-recorded, but I'm such enjoying this tonight. I'm in one of the houses that we're renovating in Southwest Atlanta, and my heart is just-- I'm like, "Let me try, maybe," and sure enough, I got through, it's live.

Brian: I'm glad you got through [crosstalk]-- Go ahead.

Old Mr. Al: I wanted to say, they call us African-Americans here in Atlanta, but really, our Native Americans that were here 16,000 to 24,000 years before so-called Columbus came in discovering something, it's like me coming to your house and discovering your house that you've had for years, and then shoot you in the head and say, "Give Thanksgiving." Tonight's show shows me that we're in a time now where the Aboriginals that have been in North America and South America for thousands of years, it is their time. We're in the time of Aquarius. I'm 67 years old, older than the trees and older than the dirt, and I've learned so much in the last 50 years. We owe so much to the humble, original people that were here.

When Columbus came, you had beautiful crops everywhere, and animals growing everywhere, fertile land everywhere, and clean water from the rain everywhere. Within 400 years, those that call themselves civilized have the waters polluted, the air is polluted, the food and the soil is polluted. It shows that God's Israel that came here 16,000 to 24,000 years ago during the Ice Age, during the Bering Strait, were the original people that God sent here in this new Jerusalem, and the first shall be last, and the last shall be first.

What I'd like tonight, this old man's [unintelligible 00:45:27] who have kids and grandkids, and I'm teaching them, we owe a lot to those that were here in so-called North America, before Columbus came and thought he discovered something that was already civilized. They were called the Creeks, the Seminoles, the Cherokee, the Chickasaw, the Memphis, the Alabama, and I can go on and on. These were civilized people that were hooked up not only to the land, but hooked up to the Most High Creator. They came here because, yes, this is the new Jerusalem, and nothing shall destroy it. I'm so glad to hear shows like this.

Brian: You know what? We had the US Poet Laureate at the beginning of the hour, and now I can say we have had the Poet Laureate of this segment of the show, Old Mr. Al from Southwest Atlanta, Georgia. Thank you so much for calling in. That was wonderful.

Old Mr. Al: I enjoyed it.

Julian Brave NoiseCat: We got to get Mr. Al on the show. That was awesome.

Brian: We've got a few minutes left. Julian, your Washington Post op-ed was called Why Republicans Fear Deb Haaland, and yet she did get two Republican votes in the committee today that approved her nomination and sent it to the full Senate. Susan Collins from Maine and Lisa Murkowski from Alaska, who's state, of course, has a lot of oil drilling. What do you think?

Julian Brave NoiseCat: Well, Senator Murkowski's state certainly has a lot of oil drilling in it, and it puts a-- Well, when there's not a pandemic recession, it puts a decent amount of money in every Alaskan's pocket every year through a dividend that they have that's funded from oil and gas revenues. It also is the state with the most Native voters as a portion of its population of any other state. Actually, there's a very interesting political history here, where Senator Murkowski actually lost her primary in 2010 to a right-wing challenger, a guy named Joe Miller, a Tea Party candidate, and then ran a successful write-in campaign.

She's actually one of only two US senators to ever win a write-in campaign, the other one being Strom Thurmond of all people. She won that campaign with a significant turnout and support from Alaska Natives, and so Murkowski, actually, was kind of squeezed between a major industry of her state and a major base of her political support in her state, so I think it was very interesting to see her support Congresswoman Haaland's nomination. I actually wrote a story about this for Politico Magazine about a week and a half ago.

Then Collins does not have a significant Native presence in the State of Maine, but she does have a significant-- There are a not-insignificant amount of Native people in Maine, and I know that they were reaching out to her asking her to support Congresswoman Haaland's historic nomination. Although Native people often aren't seen, particularly in politics, most people don't ever think about Native voters, Native people actually can be significant political players. I think that that was a big part of the story of why Deb Haaland has gotten Republican support despite the fact that she's a progressive.

Brian: In our last 45 seconds or so, why did you call your article Why Republicans Fear Deb Haaland?

Julian Brave NoiseCat: Well, the secret is I don't usually choose the headlines, but the rest [crosstalk]--

Brian: Yes, that's every writer's secret. Is it their ties to the oil and gas industry and how much some of the senators on the committee are funded by them?

Julian Brave NoiseCat: I think that that's a big part of it. Then the other part of it is that, I think there's a deep-seated fear in the conservative psychology of the Indigenous and dispossessed finally getting our power. One of the subtexts that I heard in a lot of the Republican statements about Haaland was that somehow, the first Native American cabinet secretary was going to take away their way of life, and their economic systems, and all that, which obviously is a very ironic statement coming from [crosstalk]--

Brian: Julian, we got to go. Thank you so much for coming on with us. We really, really appreciate it.

Julian Brave NoiseCat: Thank you. It's always a pleasure, really appreciate it.

Brian: That's it for this week's edition of America, Are We Ready, a Thursday night national call-in for the first 100 days of the Biden presidency. We thank tonight's guests one more time, Julian Brave NoiseCat and Joy Harjo. Next Thursday, it'll be day 51, and we'll do a first 100 days halftime scorecard. If you're interested, you can listen to my national politics podcast called Brian Lehrer, A Daily Politics Podcast, or I'll see you back here next Thursday night for America Are, We Ready?

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