{"id":444052,"date":"2026-02-02T04:37:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T04:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/444052\/"},"modified":"2026-02-02T04:37:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T04:37:09","slug":"fearing-ice-native-americans-rush-to-acquire-tribal-ids-and-prove-their-right-to-belong-in-the-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/444052\/","title":{"rendered":"Fearing ICE, Native Americans rush to acquire tribal IDs and prove their right to belong in the US"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AP<\/p>\n

By Graham Lee Brewer, Savannah Peters and Stewart Huntington, AP\/ICT<\/p>\n

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) \u2014 When U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement flooded Minneapolis, Shane Mantz dug his Choctaw Nation citizenship card out of a box on his dresser and slid it into his wallet.<\/p>\n

Some strangers mistake the pest-control company manager for Latino, he said, and he fears getting caught up in ICE raids<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Like Mantz, many Native Americans are carrying tribal documents proving their U.S. citizenship in case they are stopped or questioned by federal immigration agents. This is why dozens of the 575 federally recognized Native nations are making it easier to get tribal IDs. They\u2019re waiving fees, lowering the age of eligibility \u2014 ranging from 5 to 18 nationwide \u2014 and printing the cards faster.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the first time tribal IDs have been widely used as proof of U.S. citizenship and protection against federal law enforcement, said David Wilkins, an expert on Native politics and governance at the University of Richmond.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think there\u2019s anything historically comparable,\u201d Wilkins said. \u201cI find it terribly frustrating and disheartening.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Native Americans around the country rush to secure documents proving their right to live in the United States, many see a bitter irony.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the first people of this land, there\u2019s no reason why Native Americans should have their citizenship questioned,\u201d said Jaqueline De Le\u00f3n, a senior staff attorney with the nonprofit Native American Rights Fund and member of Isleta Pueblo.<\/p>\n

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said in an email that \u201cour agents are properly trained to determine alienage and removability.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cUnder the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, DHS law enforcement uses \u2018reasonable suspicion\u2019 to make arrests. The Supreme Court recently vindicated us on this question,\u201d the email read.<\/p>\n

In September, the Supreme Court allowed ICE agents to use a person\u2019s apparent race and ethnicity as a factor in deciding whether to detain them.<\/p>\n

Native identity in a new age of fear<\/p>\n

Since the mid- to late 1800s, the U.S. government has kept detailed genealogical records to estimate Native Americans\u2019 fraction of \u201cIndian blood\u201d and determine their eligibility for health care, housing, education and other services owed under federal legal responsibilities. Those records were also used to aid federal assimilation efforts and chip away at tribal sovereignty, communal lands and identity.<\/p>\n

Beginning in the late 1960s, many tribal nations began issuing their own forms of identification. In the last two decades, tribal photo ID cards have become commonplace and can be used to vote in tribal elections, to prove U.S. work eligibility and for domestic air travel.<\/p>\n

About 70% of Native Americans today live in urban areas, including tens of thousands in the Twin Cities, one of the largest urban Native populations in the country.<\/p>\n

There, in early January, a top ICE official announced the \u201clargest immigration operation ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

Masked, heavily armed agents traveling in convoys of unmarked SUVs became commonplace in some neighborhoods. By the end of January, more than 3,400 people had been arrested, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. At least 2,000 ICE officers and 1,000 Border Patrol officers were on the ground.<\/p>\n

Representatives from at least 10 tribes traveled hundreds of miles to Minneapolis \u2014 the birthplace of the American Indian Movement<\/a> \u2014 to accept ID applications from members there. Among them were the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Ojibwe of Wisconsin, the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate of South Dakota and the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa of North Dakota.<\/p>\n

Turtle Mountain citizen Faron Houle renewed his tribal ID card and got his young adult son\u2019s and his daughter\u2019s first ones.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou just get nervous,\u201d Houle said. \u201cI think (ICE agents are) more or less racial profiling people, including me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Events in downtown coffee shops, hotel ballrooms, and at the Minneapolis American Indian Center helped urban tribal citizens connect and share resources, said Christine Yellow Bird, who directs the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation\u2019s satellite office in Fargo, North Dakota.<\/p>\n

Yellow Bird made four trips to Minneapolis in recent weeks, putting nearly 2,000 miles on her 2017 Chevy Tahoe to help citizens in the Twin Cities who can\u2019t make the long journey to their reservation.<\/p>\n

Yellow Bird said she always keeps her tribal ID with her.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m proud of who I am,\u201d she said. \u201cI never thought I would have to carry it for my own safety.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some Native Americans say ICE is harassing them<\/p>\n

Last year, Navajo Nation President Buu Nygren said that several tribal citizens reported being stopped and detained by ICE officers in Arizona and New Mexico. He and other tribal leaders have advised citizens to carry tribal IDs with them at all times.<\/p>\n

In November 2025, Elaine Miles, a member of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation in Oregon and an actress known for her roles in \u201cNorthern Exposure\u201d and \u201cThe Last of Us,\u201d said she was stopped by ICE officers in Washington state who told her that her tribal ID looked fake.<\/p>\n

The Oglala Sioux Tribe in late January banned ICE from its reservation in southwestern South Dakota and northwestern Nebraska, one of the largest in the country.<\/p>\n

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe of North and South Dakota said a member was detained in Minnesota in late January. And Peter Yazzie, who is Navajo, said he was arrested and held by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Phoenix for several hours in late January.<\/p>\n

Yazzie, a construction worker from nearby Chinle, Arizona, said he was sitting in his car at a gas station preparing for a day of work when he saw ICE officers arrest some Latino men. The officers soon turned their attention to Yazzie, pushed him to the ground, and searched his vehicle, he said.<\/p>\n

He said he told them where to find his driver\u2019s license, birth certificate, and a federal Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood. Yazzie said the car he was in is registered to his mother. Officers said the names didn\u2019t match, he said, and he was arrested, taken to a nearby detention center and held for about four hours.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an ugly feeling. It makes you feel less human. To know that people see your features and think so little of you,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

DHS did not respond to questions about the arrest.<\/p>\n

Mantz, the Choctaw Nation citizen, said he runs pest-control operations in Minneapolis neighborhoods where ICE agents are active and he won\u2019t leave home without his tribal identification documents.<\/p>\n

Securing them for his children is now a priority.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt gives me some peace of mind. But at the same time, why do we have to carry these documents?\u201d Mantz said. \u201cWho are you to ask us to prove who we are?\u201d<\/p>\n

Brewer reported from Oklahoma City and Peters from Edgewood, New Mexico.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Graham Lee Brewer, Savannah Peters and Stewart Huntington, AP\/ICT MINNEAPOLIS (AP) \u2014 When U.S. Immigration and Customs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":444053,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-444052","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-united-states-of-america","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","14":"tag-us","15":"tag-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=444052"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444052\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/444053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=444052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=444052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=444052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}