Medicine lines and COVID-19: Indigenous geographies of imagined bordering

Introduction

This commentary examines the performance of borders and Indigenous sovereignty in response to the COVID-19 global pandemic across Turtle Island (North America). There are 634 First Nations and 574 Federally Recognized Tribes, and other sovereign Indigenous nations, bordering the United States and Canada with territories and citizens to protect against the spread of COVID-19. In late March 2020, as COVID-19 ravaged urban centers such as New York City and Toronto, wealthy urbanites fled to their second-homes and spaces of leisure. My own Shinnecock Nation, located on the East End of Long Island, saw an influx of wealthy Manhattanites to their summer mansions in the towns bordering our territory in what is now the so-called Hamptons. As settler migrant populations surged, Indigenous nations developed emergency response operations, setting up checkpoints to screen people entering Indigenous territories to protect communities and to prevent, reduce, and track the spread of COVID-19. I argue that settler colonialism is a process not only enacted through the permanent occupation of territory (Bonds and Inwood, 2016; Wolfe, 2006) but also through the entitled escapism of individuals, their movement, and occupation of multiple sites of residence for leisure evading Indigenous sovereignty and territoriality.

Pandemic exodus: Stay home…not your second home

The settler pandemic flight mechanism gained international attention in March 2020 when a non-indigenous Canadian couple flew from Montreal to Old Crow, a remote fly-in Indigenous community to ‘hide’ from COVID-19 (Meissner, 2020). Manhattanites flocked to their summer homes in the Hamptons and Torontonians escaped to their lakeside cottages (Andrew-Gee and Bula, 2020; Tully and Stowe, 2020). The urban elite exodus to their second homes in response to COVID-19 jeopardizes lives as cross-border travel fails to comply with local, state/provincial, and federal guidelines from health and government officials to stay home (Lentz, 2020). The influx of urbanites exposes the different ways non-indigenous elites get to cope with the virus while high risk Indigenous communities are being sent body bags to manage this pandemic (Higgins, 2020).

At the height of the pandemic, Indigenous nations have already reported nonresidents crossing into Indigenous territories for reasons outside of essential travel to socialize, fish on Indigenous nation-maintained docks, use boat launches, or go for nature walks on Indigenous-managed beaches and green spaces (Lentz, 2020). These activities jeopardize the health and safety of Indigenous community members many of whom are already at a higher risk of COVID-19 contraction due to underlying health conditions. Many settlers are choosing to not shelter in their permanent residences to the detriment of Indigenous communities.

‘We are sovereign nations’: Closing Indigenous borders

As the surge of urbanites became apparent, Indigenous nations began closing their territories especially to tourists or those who would escape their urban lifestyles to ride out the pandemic in their second homes, summer houses, and waterfront cottages. It is not surprising that Indigenous nations have closed their borders to prevent the spread of COVID-19 given the history of disease among Indigenous communities and the past use of biochemical warfare against our communities by settler-colonial governments, such as smallpox-infested blankets. The Chiefs of Ontario encouraged their member First Nations to limit access to their communities noting that cross-border travel is a key factor in the spread of the disease (CBC News, 2020). In this way, settler bodies are disease vectors that reproduce borders and are boundary-setting in furtherance of biocolonialism (Morgensen, 2011; Radcliffe, 2018).

Checkpoints are a line of defense against COVID-19 for many Indigenous nations who lack the resources and medical capacity to respond to an outbreak—a vestige of colonialism and failed government promises. Many Indigenous territories do not have a hospital, and if they do those hospitals rarely have an Intensive Care Unit (Boyette, 2020). In responding to a global pandemic, Indigenous nations have innovated and cultivated the resources they have within their control to stop the spread—exercising sovereignty over their borders through Indigenous checkpoints. Checkpoints are monitored 24/7, staffed by Indigenous police or security forces (or where those resources are unavailable authorized community members), and question travelers as to the nature of their business on the territory and potential for exposure to COVID-19. Individuals who do not have valid reasons for entering Indigenous territories are turned away with the exception of essential deliveries and service workers.

Indigenous restrictions are not meant to penalize nonresidents. In many instances, Indigenous governments are making the decision to close their borders based on scientific evidence and data for combating the pandemic to prioritize the health of community members, especially elders. COVID-19 not only threatens loss of life for Indigenous Peoples, but loss of intergenerational knowledge of which elders are the cornerstone. The devastating toll COVID-19 has had on older adults has potentially insurmountable consequences for the safety of Indigenous language keepers and Indigenous languages. These many languages already face extreme challenges given an aging population of language speakers (Knoepp, 2020). Indigenous communities have had to cancel social gatherings and community events to respond effectively to COVID-19, and permitting nonresident travel through Indigenous territories would prioritize settler leisure and commerce over the health, safety, and cultural ceremonies of Indigenous Peoples.

Indigenous border closures heighten already tumultuous political tensions between Indigenous and settler communities. States, provinces, and local municipalities question the legal authority of Indigenous nations to close or restrict travel on highways that the federal or local government’s claim ownership over as we saw with South Dakota Governor Noem, the Oglala Sioux Tribe, and the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe (Boyette, 2020). Border closure conflict intensifies when settler-colonial governments: (1) falsely claim to own the highways that run through Indigenous territories despite existing treaties that stipulate otherwise, and (2) fail to produce receipts when asked for evidence of settler-state ownership. Why shouldn’t Indigenous nations as sovereign nations be able to implement border closures to stop the spread of COVID-19? Other nations around the world limited immigration and travel into their borders as a best practice to flatten the curve. The presumption that Indigenous governments would not do the same, and that Indigenous borders should remain porous to COVID-19, is a settler-colonial assertion that Indigenous lives are inferior and unworthy of saving.

Indigenous checkpoints save lives

The COVID-19 checkpoints activated an uneasiness of emotion that is pitted in the underbelly of settler-colonial states—an emotional response of refusal of Indigenous claims that Mohawk scholar Audra Simpson (2014) calls ‘settler anxiety’. Simpson (2014) further states that Indigenous borders are not ‘acts of transgression’ as depicted in other spatial border studies but instead that the Indigenous border is an affirmation of Indigenous rights and sovereignty. The attempt to stop Indigenous border closures stems not only from settler anxiety but from the inherited colonial ideology to ‘fix the Indian problem’ as our nations are seen as illegitimate and a threat to settler-colonial sovereign integrity.

Indigenous checkpoints are not intended as a violent challenge to non-indigenous travelers but are a compassionate stand to protect the heart of our nations—our elders—from a deadly pandemic. However, the settler-colonial state views Indigenous checkpoints as akin to a blockade and a threat to settler sovereignty and jurisdictional totality (Spice, 2018 ). However, as Goodyear-Ka‘ōpua (2017) states, checkpoints are different than blockades, as Indigenous Peoples use them not as an act of political resistance against state violence but to protect Indigenous Peoples’ health and safety. The construction of borders as places of violence within the discipline of geography is evidence that geography has long been a western colonial science (Curley and Smith, 2020). A decolonial construction through an Indigenous lens imagines borders as medicine lines—living spaces constantly in flux that are not defined by their potential for violence but healing.

The ability to enter Indigenous territories is a gift, not an entitlement, and in a time of crisis non-indigenous peoples must respect Indigenous nation sovereignty and our right to deny access to protect the health and safety of our communities. The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated settler colonial ‘logics of extermination’ (Wolfe, 2006) as non-indigenous peoples fled urban epicenters of the disease to their vacation homes, bordering areas of Indigenous territories, exploiting limited resources without concern for how their actions might contribute to the eradication of high-risk populations, including Indigenous nations. As Grimwood et al. (2019) note, settler logic constructs spaces of leisure and second-homes as entitlements for escape. However, COVID-19 has shown us that saving Indigenous lives is worth more than the right to access a second-home.

Conclusion

This commentary positions Indigenous geographical imaginaries of borders as an act of sovereignty and compassionate community care to prevent, reduce, and track the spread of COVID-19 in Indigenous territories. The enactment of border checkpoints by Indigenous nations expands our understanding of Indigenous geographies not just as sites of resistance (Barker and Pickerill, 2019) but as sites of love, compassion, reconciliation, and relationality.

Indigenous nations are sovereign nations and have an inherent right to protect citizens and control borders. Among Indigenous Peoples and settlers on Turtle Island, no life is more important than another. Our original treaties and wampum agreements, such as the Dish With One Spoon, taught us that we must care for each other and share our resources which should include COVID-19 tests, PPEs, and other supplies. It also means that we must respect the sovereign integrity of each other’s territories, and we must recognize that travel is a privilege, not an entitlement, if we want to stop the spread of this disease. Settler escapism and urban flight to imagined geographies that erase Indigenous existence further settler coloniality and dispossession of Indigenous Peoples. People can show solidarity with Indigenous nations by staying home (their permanent homes) and supporting Indigenous sovereignty by respecting Indigenous checkpoints and border closures.