Activists have started a petition on the White House website urging Obama to change the name of Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples’ Day

“Columbus Day” was made a federal holiday in 1934, when Native American nations and communities had little voice to protest the celebration of the onset of colonization and genocide in the Western Hemisphere.

In the era of global decolonization, Native Americans remained colonized. Columbus Day is a painful symbol of that traumatic past.

It’s time for the US government to acknowledge its colonial past and make a commitment to decolonization. Doing away with the celebration of Columbus, the very face of European colonialism, could be that gesture. In its place, proclaim that fateful date of the onset of colonialism as a Day of Solidarity and Mourning with the Indigenous Peoples.

Change the Columbus Day holiday to Indigenous Peoples' Day.