Harassment pervades the Bureau of Indian Affairs

In fact, according to the surveys, employees with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, an agency staffed mostly by American Indians, experience more harassment than other Interior agencies. The problem is acute across the BIA, an underfunded agency whose employees are scattered across 12 different regional offices in Indian Country. The bureau has a long, complicated history with Indigenous people; it was first established under the War Department in 1824, with the explicit purpose of assimilating Native Americans into non-Native culture. The survey’s findings raise big questions: How can the agency fulfill its stated mission — empowering tribal governments — when it is so rife with harassment? Recent investigations show that little meaningful action has been taken to prevent such harassment, or address it when it is reported...more