Sioux Falls, South Dakota – Earlier this month, a popular conservative media personality made a post on her X account that shocked many tribal leaders across the country, including one from South Dakota.
Ann Coulter sent the now-deleted post, which read: “We didn’t kill enough Indians,” to her 1.2 million X followers in response to a 2023 video of University of Minnesota professor Melanie Yazzie discussing decolonization and climate change.
On Tuesday, Oglala Sioux Tribe President Frank Star Comes Out issued a statement saying, “Ann Coulter’s words are not only an affront to our tribe and our ancestors; they are a dangerous expression of white supremacy that encourages extremism and domestic terrorism.”
Allison Renville, a community activist in Sioux Falls and Executive Director of TiWakan, discussed the post’s potential impact on the Native American community. She emphasized the importance of monitoring these comments.
Renville went on to say that comments like Coulter’s are disappointing not only because they are clickbait, but they are also ignorant.
“Continuing to encourage folks to get educated is important, as we all know there are over 700 tribes in the United States, so at any point in time you can figure out what land you’re on, whose land you’re on and educate yourself on what those people went through,” Renville told CNN.
President Star Comes Out also urged the DOJ, specifically the FBI, to look into whether Coulter’s statement violated federal hate crime statutes or federal laws prohibiting the incitement of violence against Indigenous people.
When it includes targeting a specific demographic of Americans who have already been made vulnerable and victimized by the American system, it becomes a hate crime. “When you target a specific group of people, it should be taken seriously,” Renville stated.
A federal hate crime is defined as a crime motivated by bias against race, color, religion, national origin, or other factors.
So far, the DOJ and FBI have not confirmed whether or not an investigation is taking place.
