Political Quotes

“Mr. Chair, my amendment to the Violence Against Women Act shines a light on a crisis that has been ignored for too long by this body: the crisis of missing and murdered indigenous women. In Indian Country, American Indians and Alaska Native women experience murder rates ten times the national average. One study found that there were 5,712 reported cases of missing indigenous women in 2016. In reality, the numbers are even worse than this, because indigenous women are often underrepresented in national and local data. Just one example of the thousands of heartbreaking cases of missing and murdered women and girls is Ashlynne Mike, an 11-year-old Navajo girl. In 2016, Ashlynne and her 9-year-old brother, Ian, were tricked into accepting a ride home from a stranger while playing after school on the Navajo Reservation. When Ashlynne and Ian did not return home, her family contacted the authorities. Ian was eventually found a few hours later wandering on the side of a road. Friends and family members then mobilized a search party for Ashlynne and spread the news of her abduction through texts and social media. However, because of the jurisdictional issues, an official AMBER Alert wasn't issued until 12 hours after her disappearance. According to a study on children abductions by the Washington State Attorney General's Office, 76 percent of kidnapped children are killed within the first 3 hours. Eventually, Ashlynne's body was found by family members near a dirt road.…”