The comments were made during a House Tribal Affairs Committee hearing last week as Alaska Native justice advocates urged lawmakers to address the crisis of murdered and missing Indigenous people.
Updated: 7 hours agoMembers of the Alaska House Tribal Affairs Committee hear from Deputy Education Committee Joel Isaak about plans for tribal compacting in schools on Monday. Rep. Sarah Vance, R-Homer, apologized on Monday on the House floor for comments she made last week suggesting that Alaska Native justice advocates exclude white women. Left to right: Rep. Ben Carpenter, R-Nikiski, Rep. Maxine Dibert, D-Fairbanks, Rep. CJ McCormick, D-Bethel, Rep. Thomas Baker, R-Kotzebue, and Rep.
“What I hear in this committee is that Alaska Native women feel that it’s exclusive to your experience. Because it sounds exactly what I have heard of white women in my community. It’s the same thing,” Vance said last Wednesday. “But what I continue to hear in this committee over and over again, as if you’re the only one. And I know that’s not your heart.”
“There’s clearly a mass of Alaskan Native women who have been abused at very high rates. But I can tell you, there are innumerable white women who have the same internal experience of the trauma that Native women have expressed,” she said last Wednesday.Fairbanks Democratic Rep. Ashley Carrick said after Vance’s comments, that as a white woman, it hurt her heart to hear about the disparities facing Alaska Native women.
“When we talk about sexual violence and justice, it’s messy and dirty, and my words created offense,” Vance said. “It is not my heart or my intention to ever create an offense, especially on such a deeply important topic to Alaskans. I in no way want to dishonor the voice of the victims of sexual violence, or the Alaska Native voice, who has been crying out for justice for so long.”
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