Biden apologizes for federal government’s role in brutal Indian boarding schools

President Joe Biden apologized Friday for atrocities committed against Native American children at federally supported boarding schools.

Calling it one of the most horrific chapters in American history, Biden told a group at the Gila River Indian Community: “I formally apologize as president of the United States of America for what we did … it’s long overdue.”

“Frankly, there is no excuse that it took over 50 years to make this apology,” President Biden added.

A report issued by the United States Department of the Interior states that 973 American Indian, Alaska Native, and Hawaiian children died while attending boarding schools in the 19th and 20th centuries. The report also indicated at least 74 marked and unmarked burial places in several dozen school facilities.

The 417 institutions in 37 states or territories at the time were designed to assimilate Native American children and were often run by religious organizations using federal funds. However, conditions were often brutal. In some cases, children were taken from their homes and sent to remote schools, where they were stripped of their indigenous clothes and names and banned from speaking their native languages.

In an interview with Scripps News ahead of Biden’s apology, Deb Haaland, secretary of the Department of the Interior, talked about why this issue is personal to her.

“My grandparents were taken to boarding school, so I understand and have experienced how this terrible period affected my family,” she said.

Biden praised Haaland on Friday, saying it was important that she lead a department that was once responsible for these atrocities.