‘Their power is being recognized through voting’

Mark Ruffalo, a longtime supporter of Native American issues, walked the walk on Saturday when he visited the Navajo Nation for the first time to cast an early presidential election ballot alongside Arizona’s Indigenous community.

The Poor Things actor joined “Walk to the Polls,” an event created by Protect the Sacred founder and Navajo activist Allie Redhorse Young. The 3-mile walk celebrated 100 years of Native American citizenship in the U.S. and honored the Navajo Long Walk, when the tribe was forcibly removed from its homelands in the 1860s.

Ruffalo, who is not Indigenous, told Yahoo Entertainment that he and the community of about 200 people who joined him were “mirroring that walk.”

Participants, some wearing traditional clothing, walked together to cast their ballots in Fort Defiance, Ariz. — something Natives have not had equal access to even after achieving citizenship in 1924.

“This is a nation that has been horrible to these people,” Ruffalo said, “but it was a nation that was built on the idea that it was for all of us.”

However, things are changing, he said, noting that the U.S. has Native American leaders like Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland, who is Laguna Pueblo, holding public office. Native Americans, he added, are “being seen in our media and movies and television and our storytelling in the way that they deserve to be seen. And their wisdom is being honored, and their power is being recognized through voting.”

Ruffalo and community participants also sang a traditional Navajo song, “Shí Naashá,” which means “I Walk,” according to Young. The song, which Ruffalo said he learned on the walk, is about returning home, having to rebuild and reconnect to what had been lost.

Young, who founded Protect the Sacred in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic was taking its toll on the Navajo community, created “Walk to the Polls” as an offshoot of her organization’s “Ride to the Polls” event, which has seen actors including Yellowstone’s Mo Brings Plenty and Piper Perabo saddling up on horses to encourage voting among Native communities. Wilmer Valderrama (That ’70s Show) also joined “Walk to the Polls.”

The goal for Young’s events, in addition to casting ballots for the 2024 election, has been to engage Native youth through culture. Historically, Native Americans have had to confront voting hurdles, including literacy tests, ID requirements and long-distance travel to gain access to voting.

“It was the bad guys who’ve been trying to suppress their vote. It’s the bad guys who made them feel cynical about voting,” said Ruffalo, who also produced Lakota Nation vs. United States, which won a documentary Emmy in September. “And now is the time for them to come around and feel their power and exercise it and have a place at the table and change the world for the better.”

Ruffalo and Young connected in 2018 and have been working together ever since.

“This is a fight, but we also have to build in room for celebration,” Young added. “And it means the world to me to do this in my community. I know my community is strong.”

As for Ruffalo, he said he’s “always honored” to be part of this movement and what it’s accomplishing.

“To come here and to connect in person after being connected in spirit for so long,” he said, “was kind of like a coming home for me.”

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