The Indigenous Woman Leading the Fight to Save the Arctic Wildlife Refuge

For Bernadette Demientieff, the Arctic was never just some far-off region portending the coming horrors of climate change. Fort Yukon, Alaska, is home to her, and warming temperatures have long been a devastating reality. “Climate change has been impacting our state so much,” Demientieff says. “It’s dangerous to hunt now; people are falling through the ice. We have coastal communities literally eroding, thousands of dead fish in our lakes and rivers, and birds falling out of the sky.”

The 44-year-old was born and raised in Fort Yukon, a riverside community eight miles above the Arctic Circle. She is a member of the Gwichyaa Gwich’in, an indigenous group native to the area. The Gwich’in people have lived alongside the Porcupine caribou herd for over 40,000 years, traveling with and ultimately settling along the animal’s migratory path. “Our creation story tells us that there was a time we were able to communicate with them, and we made a vow to take care of each other,” she explains,

This upbringing set the groundwork for Demientieff’s lifelong work in climate advocacy. She now serves as the executive director of the Gwich’in Steering Committee, a group of Gwich’in leaders speaking out about the impact of climate change in their community.

The group’s latest fight is to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), the summer home of the Porcupine caribou, from the threat of oil drilling — especially in light of the Trump administration’s announcement that they’ll push to lease parts of the refuge to oil companies before Inauguration Day on Jan. 20. Though President-elect Joe Biden has pledged to block drilling in the refuge, it may be challenging for his incoming administration to roll back a process already in motion.

“Our leadership is not caring; they are just continuing to fill their pockets,” Demientieff says of state and national politicians who have turned a blind eye to the climate crisis. This includes Don Young, Alaska’s at-large congressman and former mayor of Fort Yukon, who has joined U.S. Senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan in support of opening ANWR to drilling.

Despite assertions by politicians that drilling in ANWR will be done with minimal impact to the environment, some scientists and locals fear otherwise. Climate change is already threatening the future of the Porcupine caribou herd; research by the U.S. Geological Survey estimates the herd may lose 21% of its winter habitat to fire by the end of the century. Man-made disruptions may further alter their migratory course.

These threats to the herd could also fundamentally threaten the way of life for the Gwich’in people, who rely on the caribou as a primary source of food security. “We are spiritually and culturally connected to our land, to our water, and to our animals,” Demientieff says. “That’s our survival.”

Demientieff doesn’t see herself as an environmentalist or an activist, but as a mother and grandmother with a responsibility to the land that raised her. “This is our homeland,” she says. “How would you like it if I walked into your house and started doing whatever I wanted to do?” Demientieff hopes to see indigenous people given a seat at more decision-making tables in government, especially when it comes to environmental action. “They could learn a lot from us,” she contends.

In September 2019, Demientieff traveled to Capitol Hill to speak to the U.S. House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources. “The Coastal Plain is not just a piece of land with oil underneath,” she said in her statement to Congress. “It is the heart of our people, our food, and our way of life. Our very survival depends on its protection.” She urged committee members to vote in favor of the Arctic Cultural and Coastal Plain Protection Act, a bill to prohibit the Bureau of Land Management from administering leases to fossil fuel corporations along the Coastal Plain of ANWR. It ultimately passed in the House but has yet to receive a vote in the Senate and likely won’t be brought forward under current Republican leadership.

Despite these setbacks, Demientieff and other members of the Gwich’in Steering Committee plan to keep speaking out. “We’re not going anywhere,” she says. “This fight, we’re not going to make it easy for them.” She draws strength from her ancestors, whose presence she feels in the vastness of Alaska’s wilderness. “Our elders tell us to go out and tell the world we’re here, to do it in a good way, and not to compromise our position,” she says. “That’s a very simple sentence, but it’s not always easy when you’re up against so much dishonesty.”