ЦІКАВЕ

Beans, rice, greens and round things are on the menu
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washington — A U.S. destroyer shot down two anti-ship ballistic missiles fired from Yemen on Saturday as it responded to a call for help from a container ship that was hit in a separate strike, the U.S. military said. 

The missiles were launched from territory controlled by the Iran-backed Houthi rebels, the U.S. Central Command said in a social media post, describing it as the 23rd illegal attack by the Houthis on international shipping since November 19. 

The Houthis have repeatedly targeted vessels in the vital Red Sea shipping lane with strikes they say are in support of Palestinians in Gaza, where Israel is battling militant group Hamas. 

CENTCOM said the USS Gravely and USS Laboon, both destroyers, responded to a request for assistance from the Maersk Hangzhou, a Singapore-flagged, Denmark-owned and operated container ship that reported being struck by a missile while transiting the Red Sea. 

While responding, the Gravely shot down the missiles, which were fired “toward the ships,” it said. 

The attacks by the Yemeni rebels are endangering a transit route that carries up to 12% of global trade, prompting the United States to set up a multinational naval task force earlier this month to protect Red Sea shipping. 

The latest round of the Israel-Hamas conflict began when the Palestinian militant group carried out a cross-border attack from Gaza on October 7. 

Israel said about 1,200 people were killed and some 240 captives taken in the terror attack, about 129 remain in Gaza. The Israeli military says 170 of its military personnel have been killed so far in the fighting.

Following the attack, the United States rushed military aid to Israel, which has carried out a relentless campaign in Gaza that has killed more than 21,600 people, also mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry. 

Those deaths have sparked widespread anger in the Middle East and provided an impetus for attacks by armed groups across the region that are opposed to Israel. 

U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria have repeatedly come under fire from drone and rocket attacks that Washington says are being carried out by Iran-backed armed groups. 

Some material for this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
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MEXICO CITY — Mexico and Venezuela announced Saturday that they have restarted repatriation flights of Venezuelans migrants in Mexico, the latest move by countries in the region to take on a flood of people traveling north to the United States.

The move comes as authorities say at least 10,000 migrants a day have been arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border, many of them asylum-seekers. It also comes as a migrant caravan of thousands of people from across the region — largely Venezuelans — has trekked through southern Mexico this week.

The repatriation flights are part of an agreement made between regional leaders during a summit in Mexico in October that aimed to seek solutions for migration levels that show few signs of slowing down.

Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Relations said the two countries began repatriations with a flight on Friday and a second on Saturday in an effort to “strengthen their cooperation on migration issues.” The statement also said the two countries plan to implement social and work programs for those repatriated to Venezuela.

“Mexico and Venezuela reiterate their commitment to address the structural causes that fuel irregular migration in the region, and to achieve a humanitarian management of such flows,” the statement read.

Mexico’s government said it previously carried out a similar repatriation flight January 20 with 110 people.

As migration has soared in recent years, the U.S. government has pressured Latin American nations to control the movement of migrants north, but many transit countries have struggled to deal with the quantities of people.

This week, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other Biden administration officials were in Mexico City to meet with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador about the high levels of migrants landing on the U.S.-Mexico border.

López Obrador said he also spoke about the issue in a phone call with President Joe Biden on December 20.

“He asked — Joe Biden asked to speak with me — he was worried about the situation on the border because of the unprecedented number of migrants arriving at the border,” Mexico’s leader said. “He called me, saying we had to look for a solution together.”

López Obrador has said he is willing to help, but in exchange he wants the U.S. to send more development aid to migrants’ home countries and to reduce or eliminate sanctions against Cuba and Venezuela.

Mexico’s president and other critics of American foreign policy have cited the sanctions on Cuba and Venezuela as one of the root causes of high migration.
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CHRISTIANSTED, U.S. Virgin Islands — Yemen’s Houthi rebels show no signs of ending their attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea, the top commander of U.S. naval forces in the Middle East said Saturday. 

Since the U.S. announced Operation Prosperity Guardian about 10 days ago, 1,200 merchant ships have traveled through the Red Sea region, and none has been hit by drone or missile strikes, Vice Admiral Brad Cooper said in an Associated Press interview.  

He said additional countries are expected to sign on. Denmark was the latest, announcing Friday it plans to send a frigate to join the multinational security initiative that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced on December 18 during a visit to Bahrain, where the Navy’s 5th Fleet is based, saying that “this is an international challenge that demands collective action.” 

The narrow Bab el-Mandeb Strait connects the Gulf of Aden to the Red Sea and then the Suez Canal. The crucial trade route links markets in Asia and Europe. The seriousness of the attacks, several of which have damaged vessels, led multiple shipping companies to order their vessels to hold in place and not enter the strait until the security situation improved. Some major shippers were sending their ships around Africa and the Cape of Good Hope, adding time and costs to the journeys. 

There are five warships from the United States, France, and the United Kingdom patrolling the waters of the southern Red Sea and the western Gulf of Aden, said Cooper, who heads the 5th Fleet. Since the operation started, the ships have shot down a total of 17 drones and four anti-ship ballistic missiles, he said. 

Two days ago, the USS Mason, a Navy destroyer, shot down a drone and an anti-ship ballistic missile that were fired by the Iranian-backed Houthis, according to U.S. Central Command. The U.S. said the 22nd attack on international shipping by the Houthis since October 19 caused no damage to any of the 18 ships in the area or any reported injuries. 

“I expect in the coming weeks we’re going to get additional countries,” Cooper said, noting Denmark’s recent announcement. 

The U.S. has said that more than 20 nations are participating, but a number of those nations have not acknowledged it publicly. 

Cooper said the coalition is in direct communication with commercial ships to provide guidance on “maneuvering and the best practices to avoid being attacked,” and working closely with the shipping industry to coordinate security. 

An international task force was set up in April 2022 to improve maritime security in the region. But Cooper said Operation Prosperity Guardian has more ships and a persistent presence to assist vessels. 

Since the operation started, the Houthis have stepped up their use of anti-ship ballistic missiles, Cooper said. 

“We are clear-eyed that the Houthi reckless attacks will likely continue,” he said. 

The Houthi rebels seized Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, in 2014, launching a grinding war against a Saudi-led coalition that sought to restore the government. The militants have sporadically targeted ships in the region, but the attacks increased since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. 

The Houthis threatened to attack any vessel they believe is either going to or coming from Israel. That has escalated, with container ships and oil tankers flagged to countries such as Norway and Liberia being attacked or drawing missile fire. 

The shipping company Maersk had announced earlier that it had decided to re-route its ships that have been paused for days outside the strait and Red Sea and send them around Africa instead. But on December 25, Maersk announced that it was going to resume sending ships through the strait, citing the operation. Cooper said another shipping company had also resumed using the route. 

“Commerce is definitely flowing,” Cooper said. 
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BAGHDAD — Three overnight airstrikes on eastern Syria Saturday near a strategic border crossing with Iraq killed six Iran-backed militants, two members of Iraqi militia groups told The Associated Press.

The strikes on the border region of Boukamal came hours after an umbrella group of Iran-backed Iraqi militants — known as the Islamic Resistance — claimed an attack on a U.S. military base in the city of Irbil in northern Iraq. The group has conducted over a hundred attacks on U.S. positions in Iraq and eastern Syria since the onset of the Hamas-Israel war on October 7.

Four of the dead were from Lebanon’s powerful Hezbollah group, while the other two were Syrian, the militants said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not cleared to talk to the press. Another two were injured, they said.

Meanwhile, an activist collective that covers news in the area, Deir Ezzor 24, said the airstrikes hit two militant posts and a weapons warehouse that it says was recently stocked with rocket launchers and munitions.

Elsewhere, Britain-backed opposition war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in addition to the weapons warehouse, the strikes targeted a militants’ convoy that had arrived from Iraq to Syria as well as a location where a militia affiliated with Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard was training.

It added that the strikes killed nine people — three Syrians and six people from other nationalities.

Washington did not immediately comment on the strike, although it has announced some were planned on Iran-backed militia positions following the surge of attacks over the past two months.

President Joe Biden last week ordered the U.S. military to carry out strikes on Iranian-backed Iraqi groups following a rocket attack that wounded three U.S. troops.

The spike in tension has put Baghdad in a delicate situation. Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani has tried to ease the strain between the militant groups that helped him reach power and the United States, where Iraq’s foreign reserves are housed.
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A turbulent year in U.S. and China relations culminated in talks between the country’s two leaders on the sidelines of the APEC summit in San Francisco in November. There, Xi Jinping told President Joe Biden that Taiwan is the most sensitive issue in their bilateral ties. VOA State Department Bureau Chief Nike Ching reports on how the island factors into relations between the superpowers.
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VENTURA, Calif. — Bulldozers built giant sand berms Friday to protect beachfront homes in one of California’s coastal cities hit hard this week by extraordinary waves generated by powerful swells from Pacific storms.

Dozens of people watched construction of the emergency barriers in the Pierpont area of the city of Ventura, where a rogue wave on Thursday smacked spectators and vehicles as it overran the beach and flowed into a neighborhood.

“We have had water down the lane once before but never like this,” said Karris Kutivan, a nine-year resident of the scenic shoreline city about 97 kilometers northwest of Los Angeles.

“What it has taught me is I want to live by the beach, not on the beach,” Kutivan said.

Eight people were taken to hospitals for treatment of injuries after the Pierpont incident, according to Ventura County authorities, who closed beaches, piers and harbors through December 31.

Similar waves overran beaches elsewhere Thursday on the California coast, flooding parking lots, streets and triggering evacuation warnings for low-lying areas.

The ocean was less violent Friday but the National Weather Service warned that another round of extremely dangerous surf conditions would return Saturday.

The Los Angeles-area weather office wrote that powerful cyclones over northern Pacific waters were sending 3.6- to 5-meter swells, creating “tremendous wave energy across coastal waters.”

At some points along California, breaking waves were predicted to reach 7.6 meters. Astronomical high tides were adding to a significant risk of more coastal flooding, forecasters said.

“Overall, this is expected to be an exceptional high-surf and coastal flooding event that has not occurred in many years,” the weather service wrote. “Take caution and heed the direction of local authorities and lifeguards. Never ever turn your back to the water as damaging and life-threatening sneaker waves are likely to occur.”

In Hawaii, which also was slammed by the huge swells this week, the weather service downgraded a high surf warning to an advisory Friday. Large breaking waves of 5.5-6.7 meters along some north-facing shores and strong currents will make swimming dangerous, the weather service said.
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BILLINGS, Mont. — Since passage of the Endangered Species Act 50 years ago, more than 1,700 plants, mammals, fish, insects and other species in the U.S. have been listed as threatened or endangered with extinction. Yet federal government data reveals striking disparities in how much money is allocated to save various biological kingdoms.

Of the roughly $1.2 billion a year spent on endangered and threatened species, about half goes toward recovery of just two types of fish: salmon and steelhead trout along the West Coast. Tens of millions of dollars go to other widely known animals including manatees, right whales, grizzly bears and spotted owls.

But the large sums directed toward a handful of species means others have gone neglected, in some cases for decades, as they teeter on potential extinction.

At the bottom of the spending list is the tiny Virginia fringed mountain snail, which had $100 spent on its behalf in 2020, according to the most recent data available. The underground-dwelling snail has been seen only once in the past 35 years, according to government records, yet it remains a step ahead of more than 200 imperiled plants, animals, fish and other creatures that had nothing spent on their behalf.

With climate change increasing threats to organisms around the planet and adding to the number that qualify for protection under the Endangered Species Act, government officials are struggling in many cases to execute recovery actions required under the law.

Some scientists even argue for spending less on costly efforts that may not work and putting the money toward species with less expensive recovery plans that have languished.

“For a tiny fraction of the budget going to spotted owls, we could save whole species of cacti that are less charismatic but have an order of magnitude smaller budget,” said Leah Gerber, a professor of conservation science at Arizona State University.

An Associated Press analysis of 2020 data found fish got 67% of the spending, the majority for several dozen salmon and steelhead populations in California, Oregon and Washington. Mammals were a distant second with 7% of spending and birds had about 5%. Insects received just 0.5% of the money and plants about 2%. Not included in those percentages is money divided among multiple species.

Species drawing no spending at all included stoneflies threatened by climate change in Montana’s Glacier National Park, the stocky California tiger salamander that has lost ground to development and flowering plants such as the scrub lupine around Orlando, Florida, where native habitat has been converted for theme parks.

Such spending inequities are longstanding and reflect a combination of biological realities and political pressures. Restoring salmon and steelhead populations is expensive because they are widespread and hemmed in by massive hydroelectric dams. They also have a broad political constituency with Native American tribes and commercial fishing interests that want fisheries restored.

Congress over decades has sent massive sums of money to agencies such as the Bonneville Power Administration that operate dams along rivers the fish once traveled up to spawn. The money pays for fish ladders around dams, habitat restoration projects, monitoring by scientists and other needs.

More than half the species protected under the Endangered Species Act are plants, but the entire plant kingdom was almost excluded from the landmark conservation law when it was adopted in 1973, according to the Congressional Record and Faith Campbell, who interviewed people involved in the bill’s passage for a 1988 study published in the Pace Environmental Law Review.

Plants initially were left out when the measure passed the Senate, with opposition led by influential Republican Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska. They were added back at the 11th hour following a push by botanists from the Smithsonian Institution and Lee Talbot, a senior scientist at the White House Council on Environmental Quality, according to Campbell.

Botanists at the time proposed more than 2,500 plants as threatened with future extinction. However, most failed to get protections because federal officials failed to act prior to a Congressional deadline.

Today more than 900 trees, ferns, flowers and other flora are protected. Combined, they received about $26 million in 2020.

“In terms of numbers they’re catching up, but as far as money and attention they’re still not getting their share,” said Campbell, a longtime environmental advocate who now works at the Center for Invasive Species Prevention. “The threats are serious, they’re the same as the threats to animals. Yet they don’t have the political clout of, say, a couple dozen of the big animal species that attract favorable attention or get in people’s way.”

Most plants receive less money than recommended under their recovery plans, according to Gerber and others. Researchers say that has direct consequences: species tend to decline when allocated less funding than needed, while they have a higher chance of recovery when receiving enough money.

Gerber has suggested redirecting some money from species getting more than their recovery plans seek — the bull trout, the gopher tortoise and the Northern spotted owl among them — to those receiving little or none. Her ideas have stirred pushback from some conservationists.

Former U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Jamie Rappaport Clark said debating how to allocate scarce resources for rescuing endangered species is a distraction.

“The issue is not where the money is spent,” said Clark, now president of Defenders of Wildlife. “The issue is that there isn’t nearly enough of it.”

Gerber said she doesn’t want to let anything go extinct but that a strategic approach is needed with the shortage of resources.

“Unfortunately, the clock is ticking,” she added. “We need to take action.”

Wildlife officials say they are trying to do just that with money for endangered species in the climate law signed last year by President Joe Biden.

It included $62.5 million officials said will allow them to hire biologists to craft recovery plans to guide future conservation work, initially for 32 species and for as many as 300 over coming years.

Among them are a colorful fish known as the candy darter that lives in rivers in the southeastern U.S., a flowering shrub from the Virgin Islands called marron bacora, the Panama City crayfish of Florida and the pocket-sized Stephens’ kangaroo rat in southern California.

The extra money is intended to provide some relief after the agency’s environmental review staff fell 20% over the past two decades, even while new species were listed, according to officials. Increased funding is especially important because more than half the agency’s existing recovery plans are more than two decades old, according to Lindsay Rosa, vice president for conservation research at Defenders of Wildlife.

Also in the law was $5.1 million for recovery projects that could benefit hundreds of species from four groups that officials said have historically been underfunded: Hawaii and Pacific island plants, butterflies and moths, freshwater mussels and desert fish in the southwestern U.S.

“Each of these species are part of this larger web of life,” Fish and Wildlife Service Director Martha Williams said in an interview. “They’re all important.”
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san francisco, california — Google has agreed to settle a consumer privacy lawsuit seeking at least $5 billion in damages over allegations it tracked the data of users who thought they were browsing the internet privately. 

The object of the lawsuit was the “incognito mode” on Google’s Chrome browser that the plaintiffs said gave users a false sense that what they were surfing online was not being tracked by the Silicon Valley tech firm. 

But internal Google emails brought forward in the lawsuit demonstrated that users using incognito mode were being followed by the search and advertising behemoth for measuring web traffic and selling ads. 

In a court filing, the judge confirmed that lawyers for Google reached a preliminary agreement to settle the class action lawsuit, originally filed in 2020, which claimed that “millions of individuals” had likely been affected.  

Lawyers for the plaintiffs were seeking at least $5,000 for each user it said had been tracked by the firm’s Google Analytics or Ad Manager services even when in the private browsing mode and not logged into their Google account. 

This would have amounted to at least $5 billion, though the settlement amount will likely not reach that figure, and no amount was given for the preliminary settlement between the parties.  

Google and lawyers for the consumers did not respond to an AFP request for comment. 

The settlement came just weeks after Google was denied a request that the case be decided by a judge. A jury trial was set to begin next year. 

The lawsuit, filed in a California court, claimed Google’s practices had infringed on users’ privacy by intentionally deceiving them with the incognito option.  

The original complaint alleged that Google and its employees had been given the “power to learn intimate details about individuals’ lives, interests, and internet usage.” 

“Google has made itself an unaccountable trove of information so detailed and expansive that George Orwell could never have dreamed it,” it added.  

A formal settlement is expected for court approval by February 24, 2024. 

Class action lawsuits have become the main venue to challenge big tech companies on data privacy matters in the United States, which lacks a comprehensive law on the handling of personal data. 

In August, Google paid $23 million to settle a long-running case over giving third-parties access to user search data. 

In 2022, Facebook parent company Meta settled a similar case, agreeing to pay $725 million over the handling of user data. 
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Panama City — Nicaragua has become a hot spot for migrants from around the world seeking to avoid a brutal trek through the Darien Gap jungle.

Migrants from South American and Caribbean countries, Africa and Asia, have long had to brave the lawless, virtually impassable rainforest that straddles Panama and Colombia, in a bid to reach the United States.

However, analysts say that the government of Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega, a longtime nemesis of the United States, has deliberately made it easier for migrants to bypass the Darien by flying straight into his country and then heading north overland.

Manuel Orozco, a migration expert at the Washington-based Inter-American Dialogue, told AFP that Ortega’s government was facilitating “the business of a network of international air services” so that migrants “can reach the border with Mexico and the United States faster.”

“We collected data from more than 500 charter flights,” said Orozco, adding that between April and June, airport authorities had hired “private companies located in Dubai to train officials in the international handling of paperwork for these types of flights.”

Orozco said that the Nicaraguan government, which has remained silent on the matter, benefits from the cost of visas or tourist cards, depending on the nationality of the arriving passenger, as well as landing taxes.

He said that for Nicaragua, the new air route is an “opportunity to worsen the migration crisis to the United States and, in the process, make money.”

An Airbus A340 was detained last week at a Paris airport after an anonymous tip that it was carrying potential victims of human trafficking. After it was established that the passengers were traveling of their own free will, most of them were flown back to India on Monday.

Indian police said the passengers had paid tens of thousands of dollars to agents to help them reach the southern border of the United States.

Liliana Bakayoko, a lawyer for the Romanian airline operating the flight, told AFP that Nicaragua had approved the passenger list before the plane departed.

From the capital, Managua, migrants travel to Honduras and Guatemala, then to Mexico to the southern border with the United States, paying thousands of dollars to smugglers.

This allows them to avoid the Darien Gap, where on top of the dangers of the thick jungle, rivers, and wild animals, they are preyed upon by criminal gangs and face sexual violence.

Panamanian authorities say more than half a million people made it through the jungle in 2023, double the amount the previous year.

Most of those braving the Darien Gap are Venezuelans fleeing economic misery, but there are also Ecuadorans, Haitians, Cubans, Chinese, Vietnamese, Afghans and Africans from Cameroon or Burkina Faso.

The International Organization for Migration has said the “most significant trend has been the shift by Cuban migrants and those coming from African nations who are increasingly choosing air routes to reach Central America, sidestepping the Darien to continue their northbound trip.”

Honduras migration statistics show a five-fold increase in arrivals from countries like Guinea, China, Senegal, India, Afghanistan and Angola, who cross into the country from Nicaragua. 

Orozco said that Nicaragua has also become a “springboard” for Cubans and Haitians taking charter flights since visa requirements for those countries were scrapped in 2021.

Others take regular commercial flights to El Salvador, which in October imposed an airport transit fee of $1,130 on Africans and Indians.

Most of them “are destined for Nicaragua” a spokesperson for El Salvador’s immigration authority told AFP.

Colombia says that the majority of passengers arriving from Turkey are Africans in transit to San Salvador and then to Nicaragua.

“It is a population which has means to pay, an intention to migrate and which pays for tickets and other things to avoid going through the Darien,” Colombia’s deputy foreign minister Francisco Coy said this week after two children from Guinea were found abandoned in a Bogota airport.
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As the U.S. and Britain introduced travel bans over the past month on extremist Israeli settlers linked to attacks on Palestinians, VOA traveled to the West Bank to meet some of the settlers, who say they’re victims of biased media coverage. Henry Wilkins reports from Itamar.
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flagstaff, arizona — Kicking up a cloud of dust, the men riding bareback were in a rowdy scramble to be the first to lean down from atop their horses and grab hold of the chicken that was buried up to its neck in the ground.

The competition is rarely on display these days and most definitely not with a live chicken. And yet, it was this Navajo tradition and other horse-based contests in tribal communities that evolved into a modern-day sport that now fills arenas far and wide: rodeo.

With each competition, Native Americans have made them decidedly theirs — a shift from the Wild West shows and Fourth of July celebrations of centuries past that reinforced stereotypes. Rodeo has provided a stage for Native Americans, many of whom had nomadic lifestyles before the U.S. established reservations, to hone their skills and deepen their relationship with horses.

“It was really a way to bring something good out of a really tough situation and become successful economically and, of course, have some joy and celebration in the rodeo world,” said Jessica White Plume, who is Oglala Lakota and oversees a horse culture program for the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation in North Dakota.

The sport was born in the mastering of skills that came as horses transformed hunting, travel and welfare. Grandstands often play host to mini family reunions while Native cowboys and cowgirls show off their skills roping, riding and wrestling livestock.

One of those rising stars is Najiah Knight, a 17-year-old who is Paiute from the Klamath Tribes and trying to become the first female bull rider to compete on the Professional Bull Riders tour. Her upbringing in a small town, riding livestock is a familiar tale across Indian Country.

Growing up, Ed Holyan’s grandma would drop off him and his brother in Coyote Canyon — an isolated and rugged spot on the Navajo Nation — to tend sheep. When they got bored, they’d rope rocks, the Shetland pony and calves with small horns, he said.

“We’d seen my dad rodeo and my older brother rodeoed, so we knew we had the foundation,” said Holyan, the rodeo coach at Diné College in Tsaile, Arizona. “It was in our blood.”

For Kennard Real Bird, who rode saddle broncs for 16 years, horses provided freedom on the Crow reservation in Montana. The river where the Battle of Little Bighorn took place coursed through the land, prairie extended into pine trees and high buttes beckoned with even wider-ranging views.

The ranching life developed into a career as a stock contractor and a reluctant rodeo announcer who deals in observational comedy, including at the Sheridan, Wyoming, rodeo.

No event there is as big of a crowd pleaser than the Indian Relay Races held in July — a contest rooted in buffalo hunts on the Great Plains or raids of camps, depending on who you ask.

A team consists of someone to catch the incoming horse, two people to hold horses and a rider who speeds around the track bareback, twice switching to another horse.

“It’s the most fun you can have with your moccasins on,” Real Bird, 73, jokingly tells crowds.

Kidding aside, horsemanship is a celebrated part of tribes’ history.

On the Crow and Fort Berthold reservations, tribal members compete for the title of ultimate warrior by running, canoeing and bareback horse racing. Back on the Navajo Nation in the Four Corners region, rodeo is still called “ahoohai,” derived from the Navajo word for “chicken.”

The Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish College on the Fort Berthold reservation offers Great Plains horsemanship as a tract in its two-year equine studies program, the only such program at a tribal college or university.

Instructors highlight history like keeping prized horses in an earth lodge and the North Dakota Six Pack, a group of bronc and bull riders that included MHA Nation citizen Joe Chase, who shined on the rodeo circuit in the 1950s, said Lori Nelson, the college’s director of Agriculture and Land Grants.

The tribe recently purchased kid-safe mini bulls and has bucking horses to revive rodeo among the youth, said Jim Baker, who manages the tribe’s Healing Horse Ranch.

“That’s one of our goals to keep the horse culture alive among our people,” he said.

The largest stage for all-Native rodeo competitors is the Indian National Finals Rodeo held in Las Vegas. Tribal regalia, blessings bestowed by elders and flag songs that serve as tribes’ national anthems are as much staples as big buckles and cowboy hats.

Tydon Tsosie, of Crownpoint, New Mexico, restored the town’s moniker to “Navajo Nation Steer Wrestling Capital” when he won the open event there this year as a 17-year-old. In his family, rodeo runs through generations with songs, prayers and respect for horses.

Tsosie plans to continue the tradition, proudly proclaiming, “I see myself doing it for the rest of my life until I get old.”
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