Rebecca Nagle

Rebecca Nagle is a Cherokee writer and advocate and host of ThisLand. Follow her on Twitter here.

Tell us about the new season of This Land.
The second season of This Land uncovers how a string of custody battles over Native children turned into a federal lawsuit threatening everything from tribal sovereignty to civil rights. 

ALM – as referred to in court documents – is a Navajo and Cherokee toddler. When he was a baby, a white couple from the suburbs of Dallas wanted to adopt him, but a federal law said they couldn’t. The Brackeens' case would have been a normal adoption dispute, but then one of the most powerful corporate law firms in the United States took it on and helped the couple launch a federal lawsuit. Today, the lawsuit doesn’t just impact the future of one child, or even the future of one law. It threatens the entire legal structure defending Native American rights. The second season of This Land is a timely exposé about how the far right is using Native children to quietly dismantle American Indian tribes and advance a conservative agenda.

How is it different than the first season?
Last season I had a story to share, this season I have a story to uncover. 

The first season of This Land covered a Supreme Court battle over land and treaty rights here in eastern Oklahoma. At the heart of the case was one question. Did Congress ever disestablish, or in other words get rid of, the reservation of Muscogee Nation. Spoiler alert, it didn’t. And in July 2020, the Supreme Court ruled in the tribe’s favor. That ruling impacted the status of the reservations of four other tribes in eastern Oklahoma, including my tribe Cherokee Nation. The podcast goes into the story of the case, which started with a small town murder in the late 90s, and the history behind it. 

The second season is also about a big court case. But its a different type of story. Big parts of the case, and the players behind it, weren’t public information. So our team spent a year investigating. And the story of that investigation is a big part of the season. 

How much of the reporting and research do you do? Do you have a lot of help?
We put a team together and spent a year investigating. We submitted 60 FOIA requests, went through thousands of pages of court documents, and talked to over 100 people. We uncovered information that has never been shared publicly before. Both about the facts of the underlying custody cases, and the broader attack on ICWA. We had an amazing team that worked really hard! This season of This Land was reported by Martha Troian, Maddie Stone, Amy Westervelt and myself.

What other podcasts do you listen to?
One of my favorite documentary podcasts that came out recently was Stolen from Connie Walker at Gimlet. I also really loved Floodlines from the Atlantic. Some of my favorite more talk or chatty podcasts are All My Relations, Toasted Sister Podcast and You’re Wrong About.

Why is this case such an important one?
The court case is about the future of the Indian Child Welfare Act, a 40 year old law created to stop family separation in Native communities. When it was passed in 1978, 25 to 35% of all Native children had been removed from their families and tribes. Native children are still facing high removal rates from child welfare agencies, and without ICWA more children could grow up without knowing their family, tribe and culture. 

And this case is really important for another reason. It’s making some big constitutional arguments about the legal status of tribes and tribal citizens. That, if the Supreme Court agrees, could impact more than just ICWA. It could impact everything from gaming, healthcare, tribal self governance, even land and treaty rights. So the stakes are really high. 

Thanks, Rebecca!