Giving Compass' Take:

• Here are three ways that philanthropy can address the problems and increase visibility of the indigenous migrant population currently residing in the United States.

• Do you know how to help the indigenous migrant population in your local community? Do you know which foundations in the U.S. are currently addressing these issues?

• Read about some of the immigration programs that the Trump administration is currently trying to change.

Indigenous migrants have been neglected and made invisible by prevailing attitudes and practices in the U.S., including philanthropy. Grantmakers can do something about it.

The deaths of 5 Indigenous children since December 2018 while in Border Patrol custody were not an accident, nor were they merely a consequence of the Trump administration’s ruthless attacks against migrants of color. They are a current manifestation of the systemic erasure of Native people in the U.S. that began during the country’s founding and continues to today.

The culture of philanthropy has adopted the practice of invisibilization of Indigenous communities. Funders often overlook community models that do not adhere to western governance structures or strategies. The problem only deepens when it comes to resourcing Indigenous migrant organizations.

As the death of these children weigh heavy on all of our humanity, now is the time for grantmakers to begin challenging the dominant ideas regarding the identities of Indigenous migrants, their existing customary laws and their worldview, as well as their cultural and linguistic needs.

In the current crisis we see at the border, much of the philanthropic funding goes toward crisis management, and supports legal frameworks that ultimately exclude, refuse to serve and evade poor and disenfranchised migrants. Migrants who do not have the proper interpreter during an intake continue to get overlooked. This problem is reinforced by immigration, asylum and refugee laws that were established to barricade entry of non-whites into the U.S.

3 Things that philanthropy can do now:

  1. Fund Indigenous-led migrant organizations
  2. Build the capacity of Indigenous-led groups.
  3. Fund interpretation language justice initiatives for and by Indigenous people.

Read the full article about how philanthropy can support indigenous people by Odilia Romero and Xiomara Corpeño at Grantmakers Concerned With Immigrants and Refugees.