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Alison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. When federal, state, and local governments consider granting resources to communities, much of the decision-making depends on data. For example, if a study shows there are a lot of accidents at a certain intersection, perhaps a new stoplight would be a good planning decision. What happens if no one is keeping track if a community is considered too small or "not statistically significant?"

This is what has happened in the Indigenous community where many important concerns are not being addressed. The streetlight didn't go up. Cases of missing and murdered Indigenous women languished. Health disparities and cycles of trauma and abuse continued. Abigail Echo-Hawk is one of the most vocal leaders in the fight for equity for the Indigenous population. She argues that data is key in this fight. She's the director of the Urban Health Institute and the executive vice president of the Seattle Indian Health Board and she joins us today. Abigail, very nice to meet you.

Abigail Echo-Hawk: So nice to join you. Thanks for having me.

Alison Stewart: How did you get into this work?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: I'm a storyteller. I come from generations of storytelling. When we think about what data is, data is a story. I sat at the feet of my elders as they told me the stories of my ancestors from five generations ago, 20 generations ago. I see data in that exact same way. I follow in the lineage, in the footsteps of many who came before me. Indigenous people have always been data-gatherers and we've always used it for the good and the well-being of our people.

Alison Stewart: When you think about the doors that can open because of data, what are a few examples of doors that can open when data is presented?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: When we look at where and how both the federal government, states, and counties allocate resources, it's based on the best data available. I understand that. Data-driven decisions are very important. When we see, for example, programs right now, we know that we have very high rates of maternal and infant death in Black and Indigenous communities. We know that because of the data.

When we have that data, we're able to focus on where people are experiencing the most harm and how we get them the best resources for them to do better. Also, on the other side of that, we can focus on where people are doing the best. We can learn from that. We can use that to improve the health and well-being of not only those specific communities but other communities. Data opens doors to the health and well-being and also an understanding of the full story of what is happening in communities. We need data to tell that story.

Alison Stewart: We have to be good stewards of the data, however. You are in a fight to decolonize data. What does that mean exactly?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: Correct. When we think about Indigenous populations, we know here in the United States that we are considered a small population of people. We don't have as big of a population, for example, as the non-Hispanic white community here in the United States. There's a reason for that. Genocide. There was a genocide perpetuated against American Indians and Alaska Natives through disease, through war, through the intention of taking our lands and our resources.

As a direct result of that, we have seen immense harm. In order to improve that, we need to understand where and what is happening in our communities and our populations. When I talk about decolonizing data, very often information that is presented about American Indians and Alaska Natives only wants to talk about how bad off we are. In fact, very often these facts justify why the continued mistreatment of my people, of my relatives, of my mom, of my sisters, of my children.

When we're looking at decolonizing data, we go back to what I said in the beginning. I'm an Indigenous storyteller. We use information for the good and the well-being of our people. We didn't use information just to say, "Hey, this group is doing so bad. Let's just talk about how bad they're doing." Instead, we looked at, what were the strengths of our community? Where were we doing fantastic? Where were the opportunities for change?

Then we use that information to spread that change, to bring more good and well-being to our people, but we see Western data systems of collection only are talking about us in the deficit. It creates a story and a narrative that we're always going to need assistance from other people when, in fact, we don't need assistance. We just need our treaty rights and the treaty and trust obligations that are legal laws in the United States actually fulfilled.

That's what decolonizing data for me is, going back to those Indigenous value systems, fighting for our treaty rights, and ensuring that we are looking at not just how bad people are doing, and instead focusing on how great they're doing, and what are those positive indicators so that we can focus on those as whether it be a county, a state, or a country to improve the health and well-being of all people.

Alison Stewart: Why is it important who collects the data?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: Right now, we have found that most of the data has been collected about other populations by the majority population, so the Western government system that has embedded in it, what I consider to be structural racism. Structural racism is how racism is embedded in policies and systems and carried out despite people not understanding that it's actually happening.

For example, when we look at data right now, American Indians and Alaska Natives are more racially misclassified than other people. What does that mean? That means somebody like me goes into a hospital. Instead of them asking me what race and ethnicity I am, somebody might look at me and say, "Oh, I'm going to say she's Hispanic," "Oh, I'm going to say she's African American."

I'm going to say she's another race or ethnicity and I never asked. What happens then is that when we go to gather that data and count how many Native people have been impacted by a particular thing, we don't know. We have to be instead focusing on training and ensuring that people know how to ask the appropriate questions. Also, when it comes to Indigenous peoples, we have a right to data like nobody else in the United States. It's called Indigenous data sovereignty.

Under the treaties that were signed with the United States government, we have the right to govern all data related to American Indian and Alaskan Native people in this country. That means who gathers it, who analyzes it, and how is that shared is one of our legal rights under the laws that have been put in place under our treaties. We want to make sure that Indigenous data for Native people by Native people.

That also helps with our decolonizing process. That brings perspectives like mine into the room. Very often, I used to walk into rooms. There was nobody that looked like me. There was nobody that sounded like me. There was nobody who had the experience of being a Native person and that changes perspective. It also created better environment for those other scientists to be exposed to what Indigenous data science is and how they can become better.

Alison Stewart: Why would someone be against data sovereignty?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: Because right now, we are in a world where this idea of open data access, everybody thinks they have a right to everybody else's information. That is absolutely incorrect. There is the need to ensure that there's appropriate data-sharing, and that when we bring all of that information together, it is used for the good and well-being of people. Not all data should be accessed by everybody. Right now, there is a big push both from the United States government.

There's an international push that all data should be open access. That's just absolutely incorrect. We also need to look at it just not from a Native perspective, but there are also other communities who are affected by this because, again, all this information is being gathered about communities without community input and community governance. It has been and will continue to be harmful without the appropriate engagement, and also looking at the fact that open data access just isn't going to be something that is going to be a reality because it's inappropriate.

Alison Stewart: Is it the concern that it'll be used inappropriately if you have open data?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: It's not just a concern. It's what's happened. Data has been used inappropriately and has caused significant harm. Bad data continues to be used in a way that harms people. In my organization, I actually coined a term called "data genocide." This data genocide is the way that the-- There is a modern-day genocide happening of American Indian and Alaska Native people.

We were able to show it during COVID-19 where we had some of the highest rates of COVID-19. When we looked at that information and my team and I, along with tribal organizations across the country, fought for that information, when we got that information, what we found is even though we knew we had some of the highest rates, it wasn't reflected in the actual data that the CDC had.

Then when the United States government, Congress, made the allocations of what was the very first financial contributions under the CARES Act for American Indians and Alaska Native populations, they used bad data for their formulation on the way that money was distributed across the country. Native people died. My family members died. I lost 10 loved ones, both family members and friends, during the COVID-19 pandemic. It was a direct result of the ongoing institutional structural racism, non-fulfilling of our treaty rights and obligations, and the use of bad data that didn't allow for the resources that were needed for my relatives to live.

Alison Stewart: My guest is Abigail Echo-Hawk. She's a director of the Urban Indian Health Institute and the executive vice president of the Seattle Indian Health Board. We're discussing the power of data. You've released reports about sexual violence that was centered on Native women in Seattle. When we think about the conditions that make Native women more vulnerable than others, what are they and how do you study these conditions? What's the most effective way to study these conditions? Then what can happen as a result of those studies that will make a difference? I know it's a little bit of a compound question there. Sorry.

Abigail Echo-Hawk: American Indian and Alaska Native women are more likely to be sexually assaulted than the other racial or ethnic group in the country. One in three will experience sexual assault in their lifetime. I am one of those women. When we think about the fact, we're often talked about as being more vulnerable and more at risk for sexual assault. I want to be very clear. We are not more vulnerable or at risk because we are Native.

We are more vulnerable and at risk because we are living in a country that has been attempting to kill us for more than 500 years and has perpetuated and continued to have narratives of over-sexualization of American Indian and Alaska Native women. I'm going to use Pocahontas as an example. Pocahontas, during Halloween, I struggle every time I go into a Halloween store to buy a costume for my children because I'll see what is often called a "Pocahottie" costume.

First of all, people are not costumes and that should never be something that is experienced by people. Then when we look at the over-sexualization of that, the conversation that isn't held and wasn't shown in the Disney movie is Pocahontas was a five-year-old Pamunkey tribal member from the state of Virginia who was kidnapped at the age of five years old, trafficked, sexually assaulted, and died in captivity in her 20s in Europe.

That's not the conversation that's told, but yet that is the absolute truth. We have a country who has over-sexualized Native women. The use of rape, sexual exploitation, and human trafficking was actually one of the ways that this country as right now as the United States was built. We have to look at that historical context that has put us to be at more at risk because we're in a country that has perpetuated this over-sexualization. When we talk about the data that has to be presented, it has to come from that framework.

It can't say, "Well, you shouldn't have been at that bar. You shouldn't have been wearing those clothes." That's what rape culture is. That's what sexual violence continues to be perpetuated by placing the blame on the victims. When we do our research, we focus on these structural issues and looking at where we can make positive change, where we can change the systems of inequity to focus on the fact that this has nothing to do with me being a Native woman.

It has to do with me being a Native woman in a country that has been attempting and continues to attempt to harm me. When it came to the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, it's been going on for decades. Nobody listened until my team and others across the nation put the data in a report, shoved it in their face, and said, "You can't ignore it anymore. We will make you pay attention."

Alison Stewart: Again, the data. We come back to the data. We come back to concrete numbers. We come back to something that people can't ignore, to your point. When you're talking about the change you would like to see, what were you referring to specifically? What's an example of change?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: Right now, particularly on our reservations and villages, there is what is called a maze of jurisdiction. That means that, for example, there are some reservations here in the United States where those tribes are unable to prosecute somebody who perpetuates domestic violence, sexual assault on a tribal member if the person who is the one who did that to them is a non-Native person.

We have people who move across our reservations exploiting this loophole in this maze of jurisdiction who will go and sexually assault, abuse, and harm people across reservations because it's so hard to get them prosecuted. That maze of jurisdiction is one that tribal leadership has been trying to get and it continues to work on. There are actually provisions under the Violence Against Women Act, first, in 2013 and, now, in the newest iteration of that piece of legislation that is looking to expand and address this issue.

There's not enough money for it, there's not enough training for it, and there hasn't been enough investment. In addition to that, when it comes to crimes particularly related to murder, murder on reservations is predominantly investigated by the Department of Justice. Very often, they will decline to do that because they didn't do the initial investigations or show up soon enough to gather enough evidence, or they'll decline because they have a lack of resources.

We are using this data to get in the faces of Congress to say, "Hey, not only do we need the resources, but you are legally mandated under our treaties to provide public safety." We're using it for that. In addition, we're working to use that information to educate our neighbors, to educate the people who live and work and breathe around us. When I ride on the bus, I'm surrounded by people that are of other races and ethnicities that I know they care that people are being assaulted.

Nobody wants anybody to be raped. Nobody wants somebody's loved one to be murdered. Nobody wants somebody's loved one to go missing and to not have any word about them. We're also using that data to expose other populations, other groups of the United States that this is happening. They have an opportunity to work in partnership with us to ensure that this crisis ends. We are not just doing the education.

We are fighting and demanding for change and it has been happening. As a direct result of data, we have seen major pieces of legislation, the Not Invisible Act, Savanna's Act. Now, across the nation, more than 40 pieces of legislation in states across the country that have utilized my team's work to help pass legislation to fight for the safety of Indigenous women and girls in their communities. That's the power of data and it could be used not only by my community but by all communities.

Alison Stewart: When you talk about educating other communities, is the hope that those communities will help apply political pressure?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: Absolutely. When we think about what political pressure is, we know that most of that is held by certain groups, predominantly non-Hispanic whites here in the United States. We know that there's opportunities for them to work in partnership with us. In addition to that, we want to activate and mobilize those communities who haven't had the opportunity to get out the vote, to really exercise their political power, and for them to see where they can work in partnership with Indigenous peoples and where we can work in partnership with them.

I talked about the fact that we have such high maternal mortality rates. Mamas, people who birth, who are dying as a result of their pregnancies, that shouldn't be happening in this country. Why do we have the same rates of countries who have no access to quality health care? There's something happening in this country related to Indigenous and Black people who birth.

Our partnership with our Black brothers and sisters has been so key in us coming together and addressing that, not just for one group but for both of us. It's also an opportunity for us to partner to really look like what equity should look like. That is through partners where we're not being forced to fight for scarce resources but looking to ensure that we all get the appropriate resources that we deserve.

Alison Stewart: What's been data that you knew you needed to account for but that was incredibly challenging to go after?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: The crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. I had sat for decades with tribal leadership hearing them talk to the federal government. What we would always hear back is, "Yes, you have a few stories, but that's not what the data showed us." I knew the data was wrong. I partnered with an incredible woman, Annita Lucchesi. We released the very first data report in 2018 on missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls in 71 cities across the United States.

What we found was not only was there high rates of missing and murdered people. The youngest we found was eight-month-old murdered person and the oldest was 81. A wide range. What we found though is law enforcement was not collecting the data and they were not reporting it out. As a direct result of that, I know that there are thousands that were missing from that report.

We were able to show it and we were able to highlight how law enforcement across the country simply wasn't gathering the information. The Savanna's Act and Not Invisible Act were attempting to address that, but it was taking too long. In fact, they have done very little. I am a consistent advocate and criticize the way that they're doing that because they need to do better.

The only, actually, organization that I know of that has made changes in the way that law enforcement gathers data is my organization where we've partnered with one of the largest law enforcement agencies with one of the largest counties in the country to change their data collection system. I did it with no money and only the heart of a Native woman and a Native organization that said, "I'm not going to let my people die," but I shouldn't have to do that. That is inequitable. Should my team and I have to be doing all this work for free?

Should we really be the ones who are making these law enforcement agencies gather data correctly so that we know when and where we need to intervene and assist families and communities experience a loved one who's been murdered? No, it's inequitable. I'll keep doing it until they do what's right, but I'm also going to make sure that the country knows that these law enforcement agencies, Department of Justice, Congress, members of Congress, they need to be doing more and they need to be doing better.

Alison Stewart: In our last moment, where do you get pushback?

Abigail Echo-Hawk: Where don't I get pushback? I live in a world where death threats are common, where people can't find out where I am and where I live. Same with my team. I get pushback because people, when they're confronted with the fact that they have been complicit in structural racism, that that challenges them and they take it very personally. My advice to them is don't take it personally.

See where and when you can make changes in that system so that you can be part of the change. I get pushback from whether it be-- although now, I have very strong supporters in Congress, but I used to get a lot of pushback from Congress, members of federal agencies, and also folks really struggle when they hear the word "racism." I encourage people to not struggle with it, but see how they can make change.

Alison Stewart: My guest has been Abigail Echo-Hawk. Thank you so much for sharing your work with us.

Abigail Echo-Hawk: Thank you so much for having me.

Alison Stewart: That is All Of It for today. Tomorrow in the show, I'll speak with the screenwriter and one of the stars of the film Poor Things. I'm Alison Stewart. I appreciate you listening. I appreciate you and I will meet you back here next time.

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