(Image source from: Public Radio International)

A Montana Human Rights Network report calls for anti-Indian groups to be categorized as hate groups, saying they believe it fits the definition used by national organizations that monitor such activities.

This latest MHRN report, released Friday, "The case for categorizing what are perceived as anti-Indian groups as hate groups," is a followup to a 2000 study "Drumming up resentment: the anti-Indian movement in Montana."

Rachel Carroll Rivas, MHRN co-director, said the Southern Poverty Law Center does not include such groups on its map but should.

She said one reason may be proximity to anti-Indian groups, adding Montana and the Pacific Northwest deal with this particular movement more than other areas of the country.

"We are hoping to change the public perception in this state on the anti-Native movement and make the connection between hate groups and discrimination," she said. "This is something important to think about in how these groups fit into in the United States."

Carroll Rivas said the majority of the complaints filed with MHRN concern American Indian discrimination with issues such as housing. She said anti-Semetic complaints are second.

The human rights network believes the anti-Indian movement fits "the hate frame."

It says the Southern Poverty Law Center uses a definition of "all hate groups have beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their characteristics."

"Too many people consider the anti-Indian movement to be just another mainstream conservative movement," said Travis McAdam of MHRN. "The reality is that anti-Indian groups belong on the right-wing fringe, which is exactly where their ideology originates. They deserve the hate group designation because they seek to deny legally established rights to American Indians by terminating tribal sovereignty."

MHRN says "anti-Indian groups rightly deserve 'hate group' designations by national organizations, the media, and the American public."

The report says it looks at how the anti-Indian movement works with other extreme right-wing movements while portraying itself as mainstream and moderate.

McAdam said the benefit of having anti-Indian groups listed as hate groups is the designation provides "an accurate lens through which people can view and understand them."

The hate group designation, while having no financial or legal repercussions, would help people recognize the ideology of the anti-Indian movement.

The MHRN report criticizes the Citizens Equal Rights Alliance and All Citizens Equal present their anti-Indian activity as "civil rights rhetoric."

By Sowmya Sangam