Oglala Sioux president Julian Bear Runner spoke to The Guardian ahead of Donald Trump’s speech at Mount Rushmore and said that the president doesn’t have “permission” to be in the premises.
Bear Runner claimed that Trump going to their land in the midst of a pandemic is a slap in the face to Native Americans whose land on which the monument was built was stolen, The Guardian reports.
“Trump coming here is a safety concern not just for my people inside and outside the reservation, but for people in the Great Plains. We have such limited resources in Black Hills, and we’re already seeing infections rising,” Bear Runner said.
“It’s going to cause an uproar if he comes here. People are going to want to exercise their first amendment rights to protest and we do not want to see anyone get hurt or the lands be destroyed,” he added.
Don't Miss
Bear Runner also said that Trump’s planned visit is a violation of treaties the U.S. government signed with Native Americans that were meant to govern the sacred Black Hills.
“The lands on which that mountain is carved and the lands he’s about to visit belong to the Great Sioux nation under a treaty signed in 1851 and the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 and I have to tell him he doesn’t have permission from its original sovereign owners to enter the territory at this time,” Bear Runner said, adding that Trump “has obligation to … honor the treaties that are the supreme law of the land.”
