Above photo: UAINE Facebook Page.
United American Indians of New England (UAINE) has called for the 56th National Day of Mourning in Plymouth, Massachusetts, on Thursday, November 27, 2025 at 12 o’clock noon. Participants gathered by the statue of Massasoit on Cole’s Hill above the Plymouth waterfront.
Since 1970, hundreds of Native people and non-Native allies have gathered annually in Plymouth on U.S. Thanksgiving Day.
According to UAINE co-leader Kisha James, who is Aquinnah Wampanoag and Oglala Lakota and the granddaughter of Wamsutta Frank James, the founder of National Day of Mourning, “Native people have no reason to celebrate the arrival of the Pilgrims. We want to educate people about the true origins of the first Thanksgiving, which were far bloodier than the ‘Pilgrims and Indians’ story in the Thanksgiving myth. The first official day of ‘thanksgiving’ was declared in Massachusetts in 1637 by Puritan Governor Winthrop to celebrate the massacre of over 700 Pequot men, women and children on the banks of the Mystic River in Connecticut. Wampanoag and other Indigenous people have certainly not lived happily ever after since the arrival of the Pilgrims. To us, Thanksgiving is a Day of Mourning, because we remember the millions of our ancestors who were murdered by the Pilgrims and subsequent generations of settlers. Today, we and many Indigenous people around the country say, ‘No Thanks, No Giving.’”
James explained that much of the day will also be devoted to speaking about contemporary issues. “More than 400 years after the arrival of the Mayflower, Indigenous people are still denied basic human rights and full control of their own homelands. Change is long past due. We are still facing many of the issues that our elders talked about in 1970 at the first National Day of Mourning. We call on non-Native people to listen to Indigenous voices, especially about how to address the climate crisis, and to join us in trying to stop the continued destruction of our homelands and waterways by greedy corporations. Native lands must be returned to our control in order to ensure a future for all of life on earth.”
UAINE co-leader Mahtowin Munro spoke about some of the current issues that affect Indigenous communities. “Participants in National Day of Mourning this year will speak about many things. We will mourn and honor the thousands of Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, Two-Spirit (#MMIWG2S) and other Indigenous Relatives. We will join the thousands demanding the identification and return of the remains of thousands of Indigenous children from the residential schools and boarding schools that were sponsored by Canada and the US in order to ‘kill the Indian’ in the children and destroy Indigenous communities. We demand an end to the vicious federal cuts to food programs, housing, education, and health because those cuts are having a serious impact on Native Nations as well as other people. From Peru to British Columbia, from Boston to the Amazon, Indigenous peoples are defending their sovereignty, calling for land back, and insisting that nothing should happen on their lands without their freely given consent. Indigenous solidarity and resistance are international. We stand in solidarity with all the Indigenous nations opposing pipelines, mines, resource extraction, and megadams. And I’m also sure that many of those in attendance will support the call of millions around the world to end the genocide in Gaza and for an end to the ICE raids and deportations that are devastating families and communities across the country.”
North American Indian Center of Boston president Jean-Luc Pierite spoke on community and coalition building among the relocated and displaced Indigenous peoples within the context of American imperialism, “As Massachusetts’ oldest urban Indian center we deliver cultural and social services to the New England Native American community. The federal regime has made this year particularly challenging as it deepened neglect of obligations to and rights of Indigenous peoples. Divestment in food security and healthcare disproportionately impact the lives of urban Indians. At the same time, racialized immigration assaults endanger our peoples especially those experiencing housing insecurity. Regardless, we walk the path of our elders and ancestors organizationally and in the movement.”
