Indigenous business leaders in the U.S. and all over the world will now have to adjust to the uncertain effects of President Donald Trump’s aggressive new series of tariffs. Economic experts predict some measure of chaos in the short term. It’s impossible to predict how the tariffs will play out in the long run, but it will certainly affect everything from the beads used in regalia to groceries to auto sales. Trump insists the new tariffs will put American businesses on a more level playing field and boost the federal government’s coffers. We’ll hear how Native business experts are responding to the new economic reality.

GUESTS

Tabatha Bull (Nipissing First Nation), president and CEO of Canadian Council for Indigenous Business

John Desjarlais (Cree-Métis), executive director of the Indigenous Resource Network

Dante Biss-Grayson (Osage), founder of Sky-Eagle Collection

Tally Monteau (Hunkpati Dakota and Chippewa-Cree), program manager for the Native American Development Corporation (NADC) Triia program and beadwork artist

Benjamin Haile (Shinnecock), owner of Thunder Island Coffee Roasters

Break 1 Music: Mr. Businessman’s Blues (song) DM Lafortune (artist) Beauty and Hard Times (album)

Break 2 Music: Scream, Holler, and Howl (song) Blue Moon Marquee (artist) Scream, Holler, and Howl (album)

Indigenous people in Canada suffered a noticeably disproportionate number of fatal interactions with law enforcement in 2024. In one three-month period, 15 Indigenous people died either in custody or from direct interactions with police. It prompted the Assembly of First Nations and other Indigenous leaders to call for a national inquiry. It also inspired the news program, APTN Investigates, to pry into the factors that contribute to such an imbalance in the justice system. Their new three-part series looks into the strained relationship between Indigenous people and law enforcement. We’ll talk with APTN Investigates team members about their findings.

We’ll also hear from Marvin Roberts, the Athabascan man who just settled a wrongful conviction lawsuit against the city of Fairbanks, Alaska for $11.5 million. Roberts is one of the men – all Native – deemed the “Fairbanks Four”. They were all convicted and imprisoned for the 1997 murder of a teenager. They were released in 2015 after another man confessed to the crime.

GUESTS

Cullen Crozier (Gwich’in, Dene, and Métis), producer with APTN Investigates

Tamara Pimental (Métis), video journalist with APTN Investigates

Tom Fennario, video journalist with APTN Investigates

Marvin Roberts (Athabascan), one of the “Fairbanks Four”

Reilly Cosgrove, partner at Kramer and Cosgrove law firm

Break 1 Music: Unity (song) Native Roots (artist) Most High (album)

Break 2 Music: Scream, Holler, and Howl (song) Blue Moon Marquee (artist) Scream, Holler, and Howl (album)

Punk rock’s rebellious anger aimed at the forces of economic and political oppression and its low-fi, DIY aesthetic are among the reasons the genre took hold with some Indigenous musicians. It’s a connection that continues to resonate with both players and audiences. Kristen Martinez (Yaqui and Mexican) is both a punk performer and a graduate student researching the history of the Indigenous contributions to the legacy of punk, one short, loud, and angry song at a time. She is building an archive of Indigenous punk musicians, posters, and performances on social media. We’ll hear from Martinez about her growing archive of Indigenous punk history and what the art form has to offer to today’s listeners.

GUESTS

Kristen Martinez (Yaqui and Mexican), archivist for the Indigenous Punk Archive and graduate student in musicology at UCLA

Gregg Deal (Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe), visual artist and lead vocalist of the Dead Pioneers

Toni Heartless (Diné, Choctaw, Filipino), artist and front man for Heart Museum

Break 1 Music: Prisoners of Existence (song) Iconoclast (artist) Domination or Destruction (album)

Break 2 Music: Scream, Holler, and Howl (song) Blue Moon Marquee (artist) Scream, Holler, and Howl (album)

The Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians in western Oregon signed away their subsistence hunting and fishing rights in exchange for federal recognition in 1980. Now, after years of work, those rights are fully restored, opening up a rich store of traditional food for tribal members.

Author Brook Thompson was inspired to write her children’s book, I Love Salmon and Lampreys, after witnessing a salmon kill in the Klamath River in 2002. Her book, illustrated by Anastasia Khmelevska, is an approachable story about environmental stewardship.

Indigenous chef and restaurateur Bleu Adams reimagines American cuisine at her new eatery, The Continental, in Provo, Utah, “celebrating the land, the seasons, and the stories that shape us.”

GUESTS

Brook Thompson (Yurok and Karuk), author, civil engineer, activist, artist, and full-time Ph.D. student at the University of California, Santa Cruz in environmental studies

Bleu Adams (Diné, Mandan and Hidatsa), owner and chef of The Continental and served as an emissary for the U.S. State Department’s Diplomatic Culinary Partnership

Robert Kentta (Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians), Siletz Tribal Council member

Break 1 Music: In My Lawn (song) Hataałii (artist) Waiting for a Sign (album)

Break 2 Music: Scream, Holler, and Howl (song) Blue Moon Marquee (artist) Scream, Holler, and Howl (album)

For the first time in decades, tribes in the Pacific Northwest will be able to forage for wild huckleberries in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest without competition from commercial companies. The development comes after decades of work by the Yakama Nation and other tribes in a contentious dispute, all while the culturally important wild berry abundance has dwindled.

Foraging is also important to the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe in southern Colorado. A collaboration between the tribe and a conservation nonprofit to facilitate foraging on nearby private land just got a significant boost.

GUESTS

Elaine Harvey (Ḱamíłpa Band of the Yakama Nation), watershed department manager for the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission

Bronsco Jim Jr., chief of the Ḱamíłpa Band of the Yakama Nation

Josephine Woolington, journalist in Portland

Treston Chee (Diné), Indigenous lands program field coordinator with Trees, Water & People

MENTIONED:

“The true cost of the huckleberry industry” by Josephine Woolington for High Country News

Break 1 Music: Honoring The Homeland (song) Radmilla & Herman Cody (artist) Shi Kéyah (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)

The Trump Administration is backtracking on some of the looming changes at the Social Security Administration (SSA) after widespread complaints from the public, advocates, and elected leaders. But staffing and budget cuts are already creating backlogs and delays for recipients. SSA is delaying for two weeks a new requirement for in-person identity checks, but significant changes are still on the way. We’ll talk about what those changes are for Native American elders and how they can prepare for them.

GUESTS

Rosalind Asetamy (Comanche), chairperson for the elder council of the Comanche Nation

Larry Curley (Navajo), grant writer and consultant

Judith Kozlowski, elder justice consultant and is a consultant with the International Association for Indian Aging

Michael Bird (Santo Domingo Pueblo and Ohkay Owingeh), past president of the American Public Health Association and past national consultant for AARP

Break 1 Music: 500 Years O’ Blues (song) Digging Roots (artist) Seeds (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)

Vaccines for the coronavirus have reduced the scope and severity of COVID-19 infections, but for as many as a third of the people who contract COVID, symptoms of the disease persist and cause potentially disabling affects day after day. Long COVID affects as many as 23 million Americans. Symptoms include persistent headaches, fatigue, shortness of breath, and memory and concentration problems. In addition to the personal and medical burdens, several studies indicate the global financial drain from long COVID is anywhere from $1 trillion to $6 trillion. The Trump administration just announced it is closing the federal office that facilitates research and information-sharing among medical institutions on long COVID.

GUESTS

Rebecca Nagle (Cherokee), writer, advocate, host of the podcast This Land, and author of By the Fire We Carry

Rita Bilagody (Navajo), activist and grandma

Troy Montserrat-Gonzales (Lumbee and Chicana), mental health therapist and health care consultant

Dr. Ivy Hurowitz, associate professor Division of Infectious Diseases at University of New Mexico Department of Internal Medicine

Dr. Douglas Perkins, professor of Medicine and director of the Center for Global Health in the University of New Mexico Department of Internal Medicine

Break 1 Music: Healing Song (song) Red Hawk Medicine Drum (artist) New Beginnings (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)

The unpredictable availability of salmon and other fish in Alaska is putting additional pressure on the practice of subsistence fishing for Alaska Native residents. A federal board just opened up subsistence fishing and hunting — something reserved only for rural residents — to all 14,000 residents of Ketchikan. The State of Alaska is fighting a federal panel’s approval of a COVID-era emergency subsistence hunt for citizens in Kake. Meanwhile, stakeholders are closely watching a legal conflict over fishing on the Kuskokwim River that has implications for decades of legal precedents over subsistence fishing access.

GUESTS

Ilsxílee Stáng / Gloria Burns (Haida), president of the Ketchikan Indian Community

Nathaniel Amdur-Clark (Citizen Potawatomi), partner at Sonosky, Chambers, Sachse, Miller, and Monkman, LLP

Break 1 Music: They Sing to Each Other (song) Pamyua (artist) Side A Side B (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)

Native Hawaiian writer Norma Kawelokū Wong tells us our current reality is “drifting haphazardly in the riptide of collapse”. Wong is both a Zen Master and an experienced political strategist, having advised prominent figures including Hawaii’s first Native Hawaiian Governor, John D. Waiheʻe III. She also offered guidance and mediation on some of Hawaii’s most high profile and vexing conflicts, including the U.S. Navy’s $344 million clean-up of munitions on Kahoʻolawe Island, telescope construction on Mauna Kea, and recovery following the devastating wildfire in Lahaina. In her new book, When No Thing Works, she weaves poetry, politics, and spiritual wisdom together into a lesson for navigating crises.

Break 1 music: No luna i Kahalekai (Hula ‘Ala’apapa) (song) Joe Kahaulelio (artist) Ancient Hula Hawaiian Style: Vol. 1 Hula Kuahu (album)

Break 2 Music: Beautiful Flower (song) Cree Confederation (artist) Kihtawasoh Wapakwani (album)

Mi’kmaq fiddler and songwriter Morgan Toney’s brand new album hopes to Heal The Divide for listeners. Shoshone poet and writer Tanaya Winder is releasing her first album of music, Call Back Your Heart, soon. And Navajo-fronted Tucson band The Reztones are bringing their high energy psychobilly sound on the road in their home state of Arizona and packing songs from their latest album, Chest Full of Arrows. We’ll add these artists to our Native Playlist and hear samples of their work.

GUESTS

Morgan Toney (Mi’kmaq), fiddler, singer, and songwriter

Ace Begay (Diné), vocalist for The Reztones

Tanaya Winder (Southern Ute, Pyramid Lake Paiute, Diné, and enrolled with the Duckwater Shoshone Tribe) musical artist, writer, and motivational speaker

Break 1 Music: The Calling (song) Morgan Toney (artist) Heal the Divide (album)

Break 2 Music: Honor Song (song) Blackfoot Confederacy (artist) Hear the Beat (album)