tribes the ability to force oil and gas industries respect their environmental protection goals, as well as federally implemented programs aimed to improve healthcare and welfare services to native communities21. The abolishment of the Indian Child Welfare Act directly affects the preservation of the essential policies which constitute the basis of modern indigenous law. Hence, without the endorsement of UNDRIP by the U.S. government, there is no international legal document influential nor binding to pressure the U.S. government to actively pursue legislation to guarantee indigenous rights, address the MMIWG crisis, or prevent cultural genocide. Although colonization seems ancient to many individuals, it thrives for the Native American community and is in motion daily. III.
CASE STUDY: MEXICO
The vivid state of Mexico harbors a population of indigenous peoples reaching within the top five countries with the highest number of native peoples present today. The nation’s highest density is within the states of Chiapas, Yucatan, and Oaxaca, where a culture of indigenous revolution resides. The Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) often uses the foliage of Chiapas as shelter and has made a home in the state. The EZLN rebelled violently to expose the conditions indigenous people of Mexico live in and communicate their rights to culture, education, and land in the Peace Accord of 199622. Although little change followed the peace accord, the party has contributed to highlighting the normalcy of Mexican state-sponsored violence, as seen in the Universal Periodic Review for the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2018, “Between 2012 and 2016, the organization Red Nacional de Organismos de Derechos Humanos Todos los Derechos para Todos reported 302 aggressive actions against environmental journalists in the country, ranging from threats to extrajudicial executions. [...]. Pedro Canché is an Indigenous journalist who faced wrongful imprisonment in Quintana Roo for supposedly sabotaging waterworks after reporting on a 21
Id. at 11. Jeffrey N. Gesell, Customary indigenous law in the Mexican Judicial System, (1997). https://digitalcommons.law.uga.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1495&context=gjicl 22
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