President Biden officially apologizes for Native American boarding school [Video]

TUCSON, Ariz. (13 News) – President Joe Biden’s visit to Arizona addressed something the country tried to ignore for decades.

He apologized for the federal Indian Boarding School Era that spanned 150 years and ended almost 50 years ago.

Biden told the crowd at the Gila River Indian Community that to usher in a new era of federal-tribal relationships, the country needs to fully acknowledge the past.

“I formally apologize! As president of the United States of America, for what we did, I formally apologize!” the president exclaimed as the crowd cheered.

Biden’s apology also recognized how thousands of children from Native American, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian communities were taken to more than 500 boarding schools far away from their homes to assimilate them and remove their culture during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Abuse was rampant and as many as one thousand died.

There were three such schools in southern Arizona and a national map is HERE.

“These …