on Thursday preserved the system that gives preference to Native American families in foster care and adoption proceedings of Native children, rejecting a broad attack from some Republican-led states and white families who argued it is based on race.
The leaders of tribes involved in the case called the outcome a major victory for tribes and Native children. Congress passed the law in response to the alarming rate at which Native American and Alaska Native children were taken from their homes by public and private agencies. The lead plaintiffs in the Supreme Court case — Chad and Jennifer Brackeen of Fort Worth, Texas — adopted a Native American child after a prolonged legal fight with the Navajo Nation, one of the two largest Native American tribes, based in the Southwest. The Brackeens are trying to adopt the boy’s 5-year-old half-sister, known in court papers as Y.R.J., who has lived with them since infancy. The Navajo Nation has opposed that adoption.
“In my view, the equal protection issue is serious,” Kavanaugh wrote, commenting that the race of prospective parents and children could be used to reject a foster placement or adoption, “even if the placement is otherwise determined to be in the child’s best interests.” All the children who have been involved in the current case at one point are enrolled or could be enrolled as Navajo, Cherokee, White Earth Band of Ojibwe and Ysleta del Sur Pueblo. Some of the adoptions have been finalized while some are still being challenged.
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