.jpg)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact:
October 27, 2014 Joseph Rendeiro
(202) 776-1566
jrendeiro@nclr.org
WASHINGTON, D.C.—At their fall meeting this past weekend, the NCLR (National Council of La Raza) Board of Directors voted unanimously to urge owner Dan Snyder and the entire Washington NFL organization to drop the name and images offensive to millions of Native Americans.
“Our brothers and sisters in the Native American community have been clear and consistent in their call to change both terms and images that they consider demeaning. As an organization committed to fairness and equality for all, NCLR fully supports these efforts,” stated NCLR President and CEO Janet Murguía.
NCLR has previously joined with the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights—a coalition of 200 organizations representing diverse communities to promote and protect civil and human rights for all people in the United States—in its efforts to insist on a name change for the football organization. One of the leaders of that effort, Jacqueline Johnson Pata, Executive Director of the National Congress for American Indians (NCAI), addressed the NCLR Board on the matter. Pata is a member of the Raven/Sockeye Clan of the Tlingit Tribe and is the sixth Vice President for the Central Council of the Tlingit-Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska.
“The Latino community well understands that words matter and that they can denigrate, disparage and dehumanize. We should treat all people with the respect and dignity they deserve. We will continue to work with our friends and partners in the Native American community and with the Leadership Conference until justice is served in this matter,” Murguía concluded.
NCLR—the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States—works to improve opportunities for Hispanic Americans. For more information on NCLR, please visit www.nclr.org or follow along on Facebook and Twitter.
###