[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 163 (Friday, October 3, 2025)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E928]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




COMMEMORATING THE WEEK OF SEPTEMBER 30, 2025, AS NATIONAL ORANGE SHIRT 
                                  WEEK

                                  _____
                                 

                          HON. SHARICE DAVIDS

                               of kansas

                    in the house of representatives

                        Friday, October 3, 2025

  Ms. DAVIDS of Kansas. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate the 
week of September 30, 2025, as National Orange Shirt Week. Also known 
as National Week of Remembrance, this designation aims to honor those 
who were forced to attend Indian boarding schools.
  From 1819 through the 1960's, thousands of Indigenous children were 
forcibly removed from their traditional homelands to attend U.S. 
boarding schools. At these schools, countless children were stripped of 
their cultural identities, often through physical, sexual, 
psychological, industrial, and spiritual abuse and neglect, all with 
the goal of assimilation into non-Native culture.
  This issue is personal to me. My grandparents, Ruth Stacy and 
Lawrence Little George, both survived Indian Boarding Schools. I would 
not be here today if not for the resilience of my ancestors and those 
who came before me. Tragically, many other children of these schools 
never got to return to their families or their communities.
  Hearing the experiences of Indian boarding school victims and 
survivors serves to not only honor the Native spirit, but also to 
ensure that these types of injustices can never repeat themselves. It 
is for these reasons that I heartily support National Orange Shirt 
Week.

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