Introducing No Frontiers
Peer beyond the veil of western empire with an Indigenous lens
Today, on the week of the first anniversary of the Hamas attack on Israel and Israel’s subsequent genocidal war beginning Oct. 7, I’m launching No Frontiers, a magazine-style newsletter where I will pursue reporting on western empires with a keen focus on Indigenous peoples.
Though Indigenous leaders in the United States and abroad have made great strides asserting their rights and reclaiming their homelands, empires like the U.S. have changed very little. Indigenous peoples are still consistently invisible, mischaracterized, or exploited in corporate mainstream media. That’s why I’m launching No Frontiers, to bring you writing on Indigenous affairs you won’t find in other publications.
No Frontiers was founded to peer beyond the veil of western empires and colonial societies with original reporting, deep-dive analysis, exclusive interviews, and essays. This publication aims to give context to the current and underreported issues regarding Indigenous sovereignty, like international Indigenous rights, federal Indian law and policy, legacies of colonialism, science and technology, conservation, justice and solidarity movements, and more.
To give an idea of some future work, one of my ongoing investigations combines reporting and photo-documentary on “biopiracy” that was partially funded through the Magnum Foundation. Another is on international conservation practices and Indigenous peoples. I’ve been investigating Indian land returns in the U.S. and more. And, if I can, I’m working to investigative alleged war crimes against Palestinians in Gaza.
Over the handful of years I’ve been a Native journalist and photographer, I’ve had the great privilege to meet many inspiring Indigenous peoples by reporting on a wide-range of issues. I’ve written for Sierra Magazine on the work of tribes reversing Manifest Destiny by reclaiming their homelands acre-by-acre, inside-and-out there reservation boundaries, and found over a 100 examples of tribal land restorations across the country in the last decade.
I’ve reported for High Country News and Headwaters Magazine on Southwest tribal water rights. For Popular Science, I’ve written about tribal nations and Indigenous farmers collaborating with universities and private seed banks to ‘rematriating’ centuries-old seeds back to their tribes. I’ve written on New Mexico law enforcement’s long history collaborating with white extremist groups as well as white nationalism’s appropriation of Indigenous struggles for violent ends. And of course the public health and political response from tribes to the Covid pandemic.
One of my favorite reporting collaborations was photographing for “Land Grab Universities” at High Country News, an investigation that mapped nearly 11 million acres of Indian lands expropriated by President Abraham Lincoln’s Morrill Act of 1862 from over 250 tribal nations and used as seed money to fund 52 public universities across the country. I also wrote an investigative followup on the 16 land-grant universities still profiting off expropriated Indigenous lands from the Morrill Act.
Another favorite photo project was “The Seed Keepers” for IllumiNative and Indigenous Photograph where I met several seed keepers protecting heirloom seeds for their tribes for years to come.
As we reflect on the Israel’s year-long genocidal war on Palestinians, I can’t shake watching the mainstream western media in the US and Europe act as servants of empire. Israel’s war of annihilation and terror has killed over 42,600 Palestinians, wiped out 902 “entire families,” and killed over 16,500 children.
Agenda-setting outlets like CNN, The New York Times, The Atlantic, and The New Yorker have often repeated Israel’s claim of “mass rape” and “beheaded babies” by Hamas without basic journalistic verification and despite damming documentation and testimony presented by dogged investigative reporters. These reporters found there was no forensic evidence, survivor testimony, or digital evidence of systemic sexual violence by Hamas and sources’ claims of beheaded babies and other atrocities were proven fabricated. They pedal Israel’s “false claims” that seek to dehumanize all Palestinians—women and children included—“legitimising” well-documented Israeli war crimes. Human rights law experts claim the media are complicit in inciting genocide of Palestinians in violation of International Humanitarian Law. And overall, they have covered up the foundational truth at the heart of Israel’s false legitimacy and zionist claim to the land of Palestine: European settler colonialism.
Over the course of exactly one year, Israel has killed over 170 journalists—our brothers and sisters in truth seeking—mostly Palestinians. A targeted-killing campaign against journalists gets high-profile coverage when carried out by Russia during its war with U.S.-backed Ukraine, which even received a statement from the White House. But when Palestinian journalists are killed there is public silence. “Every time the media lies a neighborhood in Gaza dies”—I heard this chanted on Saturday during an Oct. 7 rally for Palestine.
But like many others, I’ve been inspired by the unwavering and exceptional work by hundreds of principled reporters in Gaza and beyond to expose America and Israel for their lies, destruction, and blatant contempt for Palestinian lives.
Come along with me and gaze into the dark heart of the imperial western world. It’s not easy being a freelance and independent reporter, so any support you can provide would help me quite a bit. I promise there’s hope to this doom and gloom, but I need your help to illuminate the stories of the people who carry that hope.