Senate Confirms Deb Hollande: First Woman Indigenous Minister in American History

Tuesday 16 March 2021

Senate approves Deb Hollande
First female indigenous minister in American history

Deb Halland is a member of the Pueblo of Laguna tribe. The New Mexico Democrat will soon head the US Department of the Interior. This makes a 60-year-old minister the first native speaker in US history.

Congressman Deb Hollande will be the first American-origin woman to hold a ministerial berth in the US cabinet. A majority in the Senate confirmed Democratic President Joe Biden’s nomination to the Cabinet as Home Secretary. He should be sworn in soon.

Holland, a Democrat from the state of New Mexico, belongs to the Pueblo tribe of Laguna. She is the daughter of a Native American who has served in the US Navy and an American Marine with Norwegian roots. According to their website, the 60-year-old’s family has lived in the southern state for more than 30 generations. As the single mother of a daughter, Halland claims that in the past the states relied on food aid.

In the United States, the Ministry of the Interior, with approximately 70,000 employees, is primarily responsible for the administration of state-owned land. The ministry decided, for example, whether nature reserves are designated or whether energy production such as cracking is allowed. The area of ​​responsibility also includes important matters related to the national park and about 1.9 million indigenous people.

Internal security, on the other hand – which is the responsibility of the interior ministries in Europe – is the responsibility of the Department of Home Security in the United States. Holland was among the first two women to be indigenous to the US Congress in 2018. There she sits on the Natural Resources Committee, which oversees the Ministry of the Interior.