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Pueblo Action Alliance

Website:

www.puebloactionalliance.org/
Location:

Albuquerque, NM
Type:

Project of SouthWest Organizing Project
Formation:

2016

Pueblo Action Alliance is a left-of-center Native American activist group that claims to speak for the Pueblo tribe of Native Americans. The organization is a project of the left-of-center SouthWest Organizing Project, 1 supports the far-left Black Lives Matter movement, 2 and supported the nomination and confirmation of Biden administration Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland. 3 4

Pueblo Action Alliance seeks an end to oil and gas production, has expressed the belief that its struggles are rooted in colonialism and white supremacy, 5 called for an end of what the group identifies as imperial capitalism, 6 stands in solidarity with the Communist Cuban Revolution, 7 opposes the use of all hydrogen fuel in New Mexico, 8 and has claimed that the only way to cut carbon emissions is to “end imperial capitalism” and to keep traditional forms of energy in the ground. 9

In June 2023, Republicans on the House Natural Resources Committee launched an investigation into the relationship between Biden administration Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland and Pueblo Action Alliance, which employs Haaland’s daughter, Somah, as its communications coordinator. 10

History and Leadership

Pueblo Action Alliance was founded in 2016 by several members of the Pueblo tribe of Native Americans to promote the critical race theory-influenced concept of environmental justice. 11 The group considers itself the descendants of the Pueblo Native American tribe who fought the 1680 Pueblo Revolt against the Spanish Empire in what is now New Mexico. 12

Julia Bernal has been the executive director of Pueblo Action Alliance since March 2020. From December 2016 until March 2023, Bernal was also Pueblo Action Alliance’s director for the critical race theory-influenced concept of environmental justice. 13 She supports the far-left Black Lives Matter movement. 14 From 2016 until 2018, Bernal was the program coordinator for environmentalist group Earth Force. 15

Somah Haaland, the daughter of Biden administration Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland, is a communications coordinator for Pueblo Action Alliance. 16 Somah Haaland also works with the Greater Chaco Coalition, which opposes gas extraction in the Greater Chaco Region, 17 and previously worked at far-left advocacy group Seeding Sovereignty. 18

Activities and Funding

Pueblo Action Alliance is a left-of-center environmentalist organization that promotes the critical race theory-influenced concepts of environmental justice and social justice within the Pueblo and other Native American communities. 19

Pueblo Action Alliance is a project of the left-of-center SouthWest Organizing Project. 20 The group supports the far-left Black Lives Matter movement 21 and supported the nomination and confirmation of Biden administration Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland. 22 23

The organization opposes drilling for oil and natural gas, calling the process, “extractive colonialism.” 24 Pueblo Action Alliance  seeks an end to oil and gas production, called for an end of what the group identifies as imperial capitalism, 25 opposes the use of all hydrogen fuel in New Mexico, 26 and has said that the only way to cut carbon emissions is to “end imperial capitalism” and traditional forms of energy in the ground. 27

Pueblo Action Alliance also seeks to mobilize and unify the members of the Pueblo community. It has a ten-point unity plan that calls to dismantle and eradicate what it calls oppressive systems and European occupations, build “international solidarity” with the indigenous global struggle, to reject Eurocentric ideologies, and restore the balance of power with women, trans, two spirit, and gender-nonconforming relatives. 28

The organization has transitioned into an indigenous women-led grassroots organization to advance feminist action in the critical race theory-influenced environmental justice movement 29 30 and calls the extraction of traditional forms of energy a form of colonialism. 31

Pueblo Action Alliance has expressed solidarity with Cuban Revolution which resulted in the Communist takeover of the country, called Cuba the “Most Sustainable Country,” 32 and has worked with the socialist African People’s Revolutionary Party. 33 The group has also claimed the U.S. Department of Defense and U.S. Constitution halt justice to victims and their families. 34

Pueblo Action Alliance believes that the struggles of the Pueblo Native Americans, whom it claims to represent, “are rooted in colonialism and white supremacy”; 35 has claimed that American police forces are filled with white supremacists and began as “slave patrols and settler militias”; called the police the enemy of living free; and calls for African American and Indigenous solidarity against what it calls police terrorism and all forms of capitalist, imperialist, and settler-colonial violence. 36

Controversy

In June 2023, U.S. House Republicans on the House Natural Resources Committee launched an investigation into the relationship between Biden administration Secretary of Interior Deb Haaland and Pueblo Action Alliance, which employs Haaland’s daughter, Somah, as its communications coordinator. 37

In 2021, Secretary Haaland met with Pueblo Action Alliance’s executive director who referred to Haaland as “Auntie Deb.” That December, Somah Haaland represented the group on a lobbying trip to Washington, D.C., that urged federal lawmakers to prohibit oil and gas production on federal land around a national park in New Mexico. 38 39

After becoming Secretary of Interior in March 2021, Haaland moved to block oil and gas leasing in certain parts of New Mexico. Critics alleged that she may have violated U.S. ethics rules that forbid employees from giving preferential treatment to any private organization or individual and from “using their position for the private gain of family members” due to her familial ties to Pueblo Action Alliance. 40

Funding

Pueblo Action Alliance is fiscally sponsored by SouthWest Organizing Project (SWOP). 41

Pueblo Action Alliance asks individuals to donate to SWOP to support the organization 42 and has received donations from groups including the Seventh Generation Fund for Indigenous People, far-left agitation group Showing Up For Racial Justice (SURJ), Resist, Decolonizing Wealth Project, left-of-center Satterberg Foundation, NDN Collective, Indigenous Environmental Network, the 11th Hour Project of the Schmidt Family Foundation, and the Colorado Plateau Foundation. 43

In 2022, the group received a grant from NDN Collective’s Community Action Fund 44 and received $15,000 from the Marshall and Perrine D. McCune Charitable Foundation through a grant to SWOP. 45

In 2020, Pueblo Action Alliance received a grant from far-left racial activist group Justice Outside 46 and $10,000 from the Burkehaven Family Foundation. 47 The group also received $20,000 from the Seventh Generation Fund in 2019. 48

References

  1. “Support Us.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 21, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/donate.
  2. “Justice for George Floyd.” Pueblo Action Alliance. June 2, 2020. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/justice-for-george-floyd.
  3. “Secretary of the Department of Interior: Official Statement from Pueblo Action Alliance on the vote to confirm Deb Haaland’s Nomination.” March 15, 2021. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/secretary-of-the-department-of-the-interior-official-statement-from-pueblo-action-alliance-on-the-vote-to-confirm-deb-haalands-nomination.
  4. “Deb Haaland Nomination.” Pueblo Action Alliance. December 18, 2021. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/deb-halaand.
  5. “Solidarity International.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/solidarity-international.
  6. Anderson, Collin. “House Committee Launches Investigations Into Biden Interior Sec Over Relationship with Daughter’s Green Group.” Washington Free Beacon. June 6, 2023. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/house-committee-launches-investigation-into-biden-interior-sec-over-relationship-with-daughters-green-group/.
  7. “New Mexico Regional Committee.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/new-page.
  8. [1] “Press Statement: Indigenous, youth, frontline grassroots organizations call on the New Mexico legislature to not undermine the people’s democracy and say NO to all hydrogen.” Pueblo Action Alliance. February 7, 2022. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/press-statement-indigenous-youth-frontline-grassroots-organizations-call-on-the-new-mexico-legislature-to-not-undermine-the-peoples-democracy-and-say-no-to-all-hydrogen
  9. Bernal, Julia. “Capitalist Solutions WON’T Solve Climate Change: Carbon Pricing is a FALSE solution and not for NM.” Pueblo Action Alliance. July 7, 2022. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/capitalist-solutions-wont-solve-climate-change-carbon-pricing-is-a-false-solution-and-not-for-nm.
  10. Anderson, Collin. “House Committee Launches Investigations Into Biden Interior Sec Over Relationship with Daughter’s Green Group.” Washington Free Beacon. June 6, 2023. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/house-committee-launches-investigation-into-biden-interior-sec-over-relationship-with-daughters-green-group/.
  11.  “Pueblo Action Alliance.” LinkedIn Profile. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.linkedin.com/company/pueblo-action-alliance/about/.
  12. “Purpose.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 25, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/purpose.
  13. “Julia Bernal.” LinkedIn Profile. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.linkedin.com/in/julia-bernal-9b402b148/.
  14. “Tweet.” Julia Fay Bernal Twitter. Posted June 20, 2020. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://twitter.com/JuliaFayBernal/status/1274198679792914432?cxt=HHwWgMCgpdi87q4jAAAA.
  15.  “Julia Bernal.” LinkedIn Profile. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.linkedin.com/in/julia-bernal-9b402b148/.
  16. “Somah Haaland.” DCEFF. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://dceff.org/filmmaker/haaland-somah/.
  17. “Somah Haaland.” DCEFF. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://dceff.org/filmmaker/haaland-somah/.
  18. Mazade, Kate. “Somah Haaland: ‘We Have a Lot to Say’.” American Theatre. July 6, 2020. Accessed June 25, 2023. https://www.americantheatre.org/2020/07/06/somah-haaland-we-have-a-lot-to-say/.
  19.  “Pueblo Action Alliance.” Justice Outside. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://justiceoutside.org/grantmaking/liberated-paths-grantmaking-program/liberated-paths-grantmaking-program-grantees/pueblo-action-alliance/.
  20. “Support Us.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 21, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/donate.
  21. “Justice for George Floyd.” Pueblo Action Alliance. June 2, 2020. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/justice-for-george-floyd.
  22. “Secretary of the Department of Interior: Official Statement from Pueblo Action Alliance on the vote to confirm Deb Haaland’s Nomination.” March 15, 2021. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/secretary-of-the-department-of-the-interior-official-statement-from-pueblo-action-alliance-on-the-vote-to-confirm-deb-haalands-nomination.
  23. “Deb Haaland Nomination.” Pueblo Action Alliance. December 18, 2021. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/deb-halaand.
  24. “Pueblo Action Alliance.” Justice Outside. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://justiceoutside.org/grantmaking/liberated-paths-grantmaking-program/liberated-paths-grantmaking-program-grantees/pueblo-action-alliance/.
  25. Anderson, Collin. “House Committee Launches Investigations Into Biden Interior Sec Over Relationship with Daughter’s Green Group.” Washington Free Beacon. June 6, 2023. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/house-committee-launches-investigation-into-biden-interior-sec-over-relationship-with-daughters-green-group/.
  26. “Press Statement: Indigenous, youth, frontline grassroots organizations call on the New Mexico legislature to not undermine the people’s democracy and say NO to all hydrogen.” Pueblo Action Alliance. February 7, 2022. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/press-statement-indigenous-youth-frontline-grassroots-organizations-call-on-the-new-mexico-legislature-to-not-undermine-the-peoples-democracy-and-say-no-to-all-hydrogen.
  27. Bernal, Julia. “Capitalist Solutions WON’T Solve Climate Change: Carbon Pricing is a FALSE solution and not for NM.” Pueblo Action Alliance. July 7, 2022. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/capitalist-solutions-wont-solve-climate-change-carbon-pricing-is-a-false-solution-and-not-for-nm.
  28. “Purpose.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 25, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/purpose.
  29.  “About.” Pueblo Action Alliance LinkedIn Profile. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.linkedin.com/company/pueblo-action-alliance/about/.
  30. “About.” Pueblo Action Alliance LinkedIn Profile. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.linkedin.com/company/pueblo-action-alliance/about/.
  31. “Timeline of Extractive Colonialism & Indigenous Resistance.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/timeline.
  32. “New Mexico Regional Committee.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/new-page.
  33. “Local Solidarity.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/local.
  34. “Workshops.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/workshops.
  35. “Solidarity International.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/solidarity-international.
  36. “Justice for George Floyd.” Pueblo Action Alliance. June 2, 2020. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/blog/justice-for-george-floyd.
  37. Anderson, Collin. “House Committee Launches Investigations Into Biden Interior Sec Over Relationship with Daughter’s Green Group.” Washington Free Beacon. June 6, 2023. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/house-committee-launches-investigation-into-biden-interior-sec-over-relationship-with-daughters-green-group/.
  38. “Greater Chaco advocates travel from New Mexico to call on congress for environmental justice for Greater Chaco.” WildEarth Guardians. December 15, 2022. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://wildearthguardians.org/press-releases/greater-chaco-advocates-travel-dc/.
  39. Anderson, Collin. “House Committee Launches Investigations Into Biden Interior Sec Over Relationship with Daughter’s Green Group.” Washington Free Beacon. June 6, 2023. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/house-committee-launches-investigation-into-biden-interior-sec-over-relationship-with-daughters-green-group/.
  40. [1] Anderson, Collin. “House Committee Launches Investigations Into Biden Interior Sec Over Relationship with Daughter’s Green Group.” Washington Free Beacon. June 6, 2023. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/house-committee-launches-investigation-into-biden-interior-sec-over-relationship-with-daughters-green-group/.
  41. “Support Us.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 21, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/donate.
  42.  “Support Pueblo Action Alliance.” Our Power Base. Accessed June 21, 2023. https://swop.ourpowerbase.net/civicrm/contribute/transact?id=15&reset=1.
  43. “Home.” Pueblo Action Alliance. Accessed June 21, 2023. https://www.puebloactionalliance.org/.
  44. “NDN Collective Announces Community Action Fund Grant Partners.” NDN Collective. December 15, 2022. Accessed June 24, 2023. https://ndncollective.org/ndn-collective-announces-community-action-fund-grant-partners/.
  45. “Marshall L. and Perrine D. McCune Charitable Foundation Inc.” Return of Private Foundation. (Form 990-PF). 2019. Part XV. https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/850429439/202013159349102311/full.
  46.  “2020 Liberated Paths Grantmaking Program Grantees.” Justice Outside. Accessed June 24, 2023.
  47. [1] “Burkehaven Family Foundation.” Return of Private Foundation. (Form 990-PF). 2020. Part XV. https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/826746205/202121199349100727/full.
  48. “The Seventh Generation Fund for Indigenous Peoples Inc.” Return of Organization Exempt From Income Tax. (Form 990). 2019. Schedule I. https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/680027247/202141379349304819/full.
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Pueblo Action Alliance

211 10th Street Southwest
Albuquerque, NM