Dishonest: CEDV Calls on Washington Post to Retract One-Sided, Misleading Article on Violence in Native Communities

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Contact: Rebecca Stewart

Telephone: 513-479-3335

Dishonest: CEDV Calls on Washington Post to Retract One-Sided, Misleading Article on Violence in Native Communities

WASHINGTON / January 24, 2022 – The Washington Post recently published an article on violence in American Indian communities (1) that is so one-sided and factually incomplete that it resembles an intentional effort to mislead. The Coalition to End Domestic Violence calls on the Washington Post to retract the dishonest article and publish an article that is accurate and balanced.

Violence against American Indians and Alaska Native men and women is a serious public health problem in the United States. According to the U.S. Department of Justice:

Sixty-two percent of missing Native Americans are male (2).
Similar percentages of male and female Native Americans have experienced partner violence in their lifetimes: 81.6% of males and 84.3% of females (3).
More male than female Native Americans have experienced lifetime psychological aggression: 73% of males and 66% of females (3).

Despite surveys that reveal similar levels of violence, Abigail Higgins has authored an article that is highly biased in its factual claims, examples, and conclusions. The article refers to violence against women 21 times, and violence against men only once.

This statement exemplifies the biases in the Higgins article: “Research shows that the overwhelming majority of Native women who are survivors of sexual violence experienced it at the hands of a non-Native person.” But a review of the actual “research” reveals that 90% of male victims and 97% of female victims had experienced violence by an interracial perpetrator (4). An honest statement would have said, “Research shows that the overwhelming majority of both Native men and women who are survivors of violence experienced it at the hands of a non-Native person.”

But Higgins apparently did not read the actual research study. In convoluted manner, her “overwhelming majority” statement links to a Columbia Law Review article (5). That article in turn cites a “Research Policy Update” from the National Congress of American Indians (6), which in turn links to an article published in the NIJ Journal (7).

The Higgins article also ignores the existence of Urban Indians, who represent 78% of all American Indians and Alaska Natives (8). Urban Indians have been referred to as “invisible tribes.” (9) Although Higgins devotes over half of her article to the matter of tribal sovereignty, she does not explain how the sovereignty issue relates to the vast majority of Indians who live off reservation.

Ironically, the flawed article was published in the Washington Post newsletter known as Lily Lines, which advertises itself as providing information for “women in the know.” (10)

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