President Donald Trump has signed an executive order creating a White House task force on missing and slain American Indians and Alaska Natives.
The task force will be overseen by Attorney General William Barr and Interior Secretary David Bernhardt. It will develop protocols to apply to new and unsolved cases and create a multi-jurisdictional team to review cold cases. The National Institute for Justice estimates that 1.5 million American Indian women have experienced violence in their lifetime, includeing sexual violence. On some Native nations, federal studies have shown women are killed at a rate of ten times the national average.
