The Tohono O’odham Nation straddles the border between what is now the United States and Mexico, where, in 2004, the Department of Homeland Security waived environmental and historic preservation regulations in order to begin construction on a border wall. The wall and other border policies have deeply affected the Tohono O’odham Nation – tribal citizens are frequently stopped and interrogated by border patrol and the wall has damaged culturally significant spaces including sacred burial sites.

Chairman Verlon Jose was inaugurated as Chairman of the Tohono O’odham Nation in September of 2023, having previously served as Vice Chairman. He has been vocal about his opposition to the border wall and other policies that negatively affect the ability of the Tohono O’odham Nation to govern themselves and their ancestral land.

Barbara Buckinx is a Research Scholar at the Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination, Princeton University. Her work examines the problem of the unrestrained and potential exercise of power in global politics, and she is interested in state constraints on, and regulation of, human mobility.

This lunch talk is part of the Princeton Native American Heritage Month, which is co-sponsored by:

Native Graduate Students of Princeton

Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination

Department of Anthropology

Fluid Futures Forum

Access Diversity & Inclusion- Princeton Graduate School

PAIISWG

Effron Center for the Study of America

High Meadows Environmental Institute

Environmental Studies Working Group

Humanities Council