Two Native American tribes filed a lawsuit on Thursday, accusing the federal government of misusing tribal trust funds to finance a network of boarding schools where Native children were subjected to decades of systemic abuse.
The Wichita Tribe and the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California brought the case to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania. They allege that money generated from treaties—often signed under coercion and involving the loss of tribal lands—was placed in trust by the federal government for the tribes’ benefit but was instead diverted to fund boarding schools. The schools, by the government’s own admission, served as instruments of forced assimilation and cultural erasure.
According to the lawsuit, the federal government has never provided a transparent accounting of the funds it used for the boarding school system. It remains unclear how the money was spent or how much, if any, remains today.
The suit names Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and the Bureau of Indian Education as defendants. The Interior Department declined to comment on the litigation.
In 2022, under then-Interior Secretary Deb Haaland—the first Native American to lead the agency—a federal report acknowledged the boarding schools’ dark legacy. Native children were often forcibly taken from their families, subjected to mental, physical, and sexual abuse, and stripped of their language and culture. Many died at the institutions, with some buried in unmarked graves.
The report also detailed the federal government’s deliberate use of boarding schools as a strategy to break the cultural and political ties between Native children and their communities, while simultaneously facilitating the seizure of Native lands.
The tribes are now demanding that the government provide a full accounting of the estimated $23.3 billion allocated to the boarding school system. They are also seeking a breakdown of how those funds were invested and how much remains that should be rightfully returned to benefit Native education.
While President Joe Biden issued an official apology last year, calling the boarding school era a “sin on our soul,” the Trump administration in April cut $1.6 million from initiatives aimed at preserving the testimonies of survivors. That decision has sparked renewed criticism amid ongoing efforts to bring truth and justice to Native communities still grappling with the legacy of the boarding schools.
