What Indigenous People Think of the 250th: The First America Podcast Series w/ Rebecca Nagle
Native people have been written out of the American story, but without us you don’t know what happened. This summer the United States will celebrate the 250-year anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. When you read the Declaration, you realize it is a list of complaints. The last entry, the climax in our founders’ reasons for rebellion against the Crown, is this: “He has excited… the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.”
We have been told the Revolution was fought over taxation and representation. But what the founders were most angry about in our country’s most famous document was Indian affairs. How did generations of Americans miss this?
The first armed rebellion against the Crown was an attack on British forts that traded with tribes. When colonists threw tea into the Boston harbor, they dressed up like members of the Mohawk tribe—not for disguise, but because pretending to be Indian symbolized freedom and rebellion. The founding fathers’ first government failed because Indigenous nations were too powerful; war and diplomacy with Native people is why we have a central federal government.
Hosted and reported by Rebecca Nagle and featuring leading Native historians, First America unveils how the founders’ treatment of Indigenous nations—and their resistance—shaped US democracy. The show does not simply add another blemish to the image of the founding fathers, it reveals the real story of why the colonists rebelled, what kind of government they created, and, crucially, how our current political moment was 250 years in the making.
FirstAmerica.info
@kirkdougherty8690
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
This 71 year old US born citizen is so happy that this came into my feed. Without going into details, I will simply say that the costumes, sets, actors and words may change. But, the roles and actions of European colonialist imperialism remain the same. And, we've been watching in real time the brutal culmination of a 76 plus years occupation of Palestine centering on what Jewish historian Norman Finkelstein has called a "concentration camp" meaning Gaza. The parallels of how the colonists that settled North America treated indigenous people and how the Zionists have been treating the Palestinians are shockingly similar. Thank you for this very interesting discussion.
@marcussr77
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Why did it take so long to free Leonard Peltier? Why do we call people "Native Americans" and "African Americans" when ALL of the early European conquistador paintings show the Indigenous A'mericans as Bronze/Copper/Dark Brown colored people's? The Hisss story we have been indoctrinated with does not add uP if we do our own re-search. If you only search what you are told to search for, you will find what you are told to find. If you re-search, i.e. search and search again- you may discover that you have been lied to.
@AKAndoh
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Thank you, I learned important aspects to the origin of European colonists behaviour, practices and policies and the consequences and costs to Indigenous Peoples of North America, which are never discussed.
I wholeheatedly agree with frustration, that it is this failure of acknowledgement and accountability that creates the latest iterations of extermination, dominance and degeneracy.
These failures of reckoning with impugned behaviour are pandemic.
@doneaton6704
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Kind of a stupid joke is how I would feel if I were an Original American. Because they've been here for around 3,000 years!
@jamiewilliams8084
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Woohoo!! More on St Clair’s Defeat!! Brings a huge smile to my face. My ancestors are happy
@tyfromuzi5871
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
I believe it was my 7th grade history teacher in Madison SD that was from the tribe and familiarized us with the account of the Boston tea party dressing as naatives, I recall hearing that before.
I heard of the tea party sometime more recently where they were saying furthermore, it was not in fact revolutionaries, but actually on behalf of Britain to ensure the indebtment of tea tax that we would continue registered fealty to the British empire, this I have heard less of and need to better learn but I think there may be some buried historical actuality there
Really appreciate all the light both of you shine to everyone 🌞
@Videooedivideo
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
❤
@javierburgos9975
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
53:33 Genocide is central to all settler colonial states there never was a "Democracy" its always been colonialism. My people have been colonized for 500 years and if things don't change there will be no Puertoricans in Puerto Rico by 2075. There is no saving the United States.
@javierburgos9975
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
43:57 This is a problem in Puerto Rico too. We have no surviving ancestral history, Ponce de Leon genocide of the Taino was the most thorough that I know of. And now there's these New Age Taino that were useing Inuit closed practice markings of womanhood and marriage for girl power retreats. It's absolutely embarrassing.
@PanchoMcFarland
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Nagle keeps referring to the U.S. and the U.S. government as 'we' and 'our'. The identification with the empire is a psychic intrusion, to use Lara Sheehi's words in From the clinic to the streets, that must be resisted repeatedly and constantly to create a robust identification with native and colonized people. Our lives depend on this psychic militancy.
@GeekonaBike
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
250 yrs ago a bunch of settlers stole the ideals from the Iroquois Confederation : /
@raymondpalagano6322
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Thank you both for this conversation. Im looking fwd to the podcast – First America.
@electra424
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
very informative conversation thank you. I will definitely be checking out the podcast
@hannahhabtu9314
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
And Hitler was inspired by America's treatment of indigenous people. Specifically the systems of reservations.
@glennamarley3170
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Very informative 👏 Wado.
@jdotsalter910
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
I live on the Dine Reservation. Many Dine(Navajos) love Trump, even the ones struggling from no more SNAP benefits.
@kovarnosra
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
You two don’t look nish
@MichaelKennard-c3v
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
The U.S. nation state was forged and founded on the theft of Indigenous land, genocide of Indigenous nations and enslavement of both Indigenous and African people.
@LaLasta
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
🙌🏽❤️
@silviopina_111
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
27:12 🤯 whaaaat? I need my salts now 🫢
I need a moment
⏳️
So it was never: "the founding fathers were so naive, they NEVER thought things would get this bad. They 'trusted in the integrity of their descendants'… 😂😂😂. Ok, I'm an immigrant too (sorry, from 🇮🇹😖) but I thought they taught us history a bit better.
Not…
So THANK YOU!!!❤
@audreyburch6029
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
There is a Butler County immigrant rights group, but I don't know if my Miami university or the Miami Tribr are doing anything about Butler County.Having an ice contract , i've been on the sidelines , watching the fact that people go to the commissioner's office every tuesday morning myself
@audreyburch6029
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Is this mention of John C Yoo. He's a different historian, not the lawyer, who helped codify torture as enhanced interrogation? Jane Meyer wrote about that in the book , the dark side
@End_Colonial_Epstein_Regimes
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Kia ora, are the links to Rebecca's platforms available? Always has been, always will be Native Tribal lands, the Sovereign dream always remains and the rotten 'merciless savage' colonial foundation must be replaced to end the endless Capitalist Colonial Class Crimes. The useless Colonial USA Left needs to promote Native Whakapapa and Praxis for new Institutions and 'American' society, not the manufactured colonial ecosystem of talking heads and podcasters
@allonesame6467
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
That "forgetting" benefits MICIMATT
@1o1s1s1i1e
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Wonderful discussion, thank you both.
@nativestacker4185
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
While I agree with Rebecca About many things , what I notice is that many young people are really not embracing what The US gives us , not just what they have taken . Can anyone imagine what may happen if The US Government and all non-Native people left to live somewhere else ? We (as Natives ) don't have any kind of a Military . At one time we had the most people (per capita) in the US Military but today , younger people are not enlisting , instead they are anti and then they wonder why some people in Government (on both sides) ignore us . What if a Communist country came and took over ? As it is , it looks like The Muslim People may soon be taking over here and when that happens it could be THE END of The US Constitution ( that's what they want and they have already have Majority Control on The Left) . Young people also forget how hard The Elders fought for things like the recognition of Treaties , The Land Reclamation Act (many Tribal Nations do not take advantage of these laws) and things like the fact that Recognized Tribal Nations do not answer to State Law inside of the Borders of Reservations , it was not always like that .
The Illegal Immigration Problem should never have happened , we have been suffering from over population since the mid 1980s and look at the impact it has had on our water , soil and air . We were warned by Environmental Experts and our own Elders from that time . Now we are paying for it and our people don't recognize it . I remember what it was like when I was a boy in Northern Minnesota , my mother would tell my brother and I to go grab some berries and maybe a squash , you just take a walk and you had many choices everywhere . Now I can walk in those same areas for hours and never see a Wild Strawberry . Young people don't miss that because they have never seen it .
The True stories of how The USA came to exist does need to be told including how we made The US Declaration of Independence valid even today . Please don't stop bringing the history into the light , but don't alienate others in the process , it makes us all look small .
@fun_ghoul
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
I actually had to turn it off after 5 minutes. She said "our country" three times in two minutes WRT Amerikkka. If that's her country, I'm not interested in anything else she has to say. 🤷♂
@imwiljab
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
🔥🔥🔥🫡🫡🫡
@emmaboyd7908
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Current domestic rebound presents the Karma for all those who are neither interested nor curious about how their nation came into being – the consistent demonstration of its moral bankruptcy while constantly declaring themselves The Richest Country in History is jaw dropping hubris. I can only conclude that if they ‘won’ anything it was the guilt that made ‘Muricans run forward faster; they can’t bear to look in the mirror & see their Picture of Dorian Gray, how ugly they really are. Anyone who declines to look or cannot see is in denial of the Horror of it & carries a karmic debt
@DeElSendero
June 26, 2026 at 9:42 am
Very enjoyable and informative discussion with Rebecca. Thank you Nick. Much appreciated!