Ann Kirkpatrick: “This is the final amendment to the bill. It will not kill the bill, nor send it back to committee. If it is adopted, the…”

“This is the final amendment to the bill. It will not kill the bill, nor send it back to committee. If it is adopted, the bill will immediately proceed to final passage. Mr. Speaker, I am honored to represent a district that has more Native American tribes that own tribal land than any other district in the country. I have 12 tribes in my district, including the Navajo nation, where the people speak a beautiful language called Dine. So I am going to start my speech tonight in Dine. (English translation of the statement made in Dine is as follows:) Hello, my esteemed elders, my relatives, and my Navajo friends. It's your Congresswoman speaking, Ann Kirkpatrick, and I work for you. YA'ATEEH SHI' NANTAI SHI'KE SHI'DINE' ADO. AHE'HEE. NI'HI' CONGRESSWOMAN ANIH, ANN KIRKPATRICK. ADO NI'HA NASHNISH. Mr. Speaker, I grew up on tribal land, on the White Mountain Apache where my father ran the general store, and my mother was a schoolteacher. My father spoke Apache. My first words were in Apache. And it is important that we know that the language of our Native American tribes addresses their spirituality, their culture, and their land. What I want to talk about tonight is tribal sovereignty, because all of our tribes have their own culture, their own history, and their own language, but what they share is a deep respect for tribal sovereignty. What that means is that they are entitled, they have a right to government-to-government negotiations.…”