At 4:00 pm today -- on the very day that the United States has reached a record 100,000 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and our Tribe is desperately struggling with responding to this devastating pandemic -- the Bureau of Indian Affairs informed me that the Secretary of the Interior has ordered that our reservation be disestablished and that our land be taken out of trust. Not since the termination era of the mid-twentieth century has a Secretary taken action to disestablish a reservation.

Today, Governor Charlie Baker issued an emergency order requiring all businesses and organizations that do not provide Coronavirus essential services to close their physical workplaces to workers, customers and the public. This step has been taken to slow the spread of the novel Coronavirus. The closure will start tomorrow Tuesday, March 24 and continue until Tuesday, April 7 at noon.

This evening we learned that the First Circuit Court of Appeals declined to overturn Judge Young's decision in the lower court. The decision has no impact on the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe’s pending litigation in Washington, D.C., and its land will not be taken out of trust as a result of today's decision. The Tribe will continue this fight and continue its plea that the United States Congress take action – the Tribe will not give up the fight to protect its lands.

The Tribe’s appeal of the Massachusetts federal court decision that the Government could not take the Tribe’s land into trust will be heard by the First Circuit on February 5, 2020 at 9:30 AM in the En Banc Courtroom on the 7th floor of the federal courthouse. The case is "David Littlefield, et al. v. Mashpee Wampanoag Indian Tribe,"  Docket #16-2484.

United South and Eastern Tribes (USET) provides scholarships in the amount of at least $500 to Indian students in the USET service area. Enrolled members of theMashpee Wampanoag tribe are in the USET service area and eligible to apply for a scholarship. The deadline to apply for the application is January 15.

This year marks the 50th Anniversary of the National Day of Mourning. To commemorate the event CNN’s Victor Blackwell sat down with tribal leaders from Mashpee and Aquinnah to understand what it is truly about.