FARGO (KFGO-AM) President Obama will visit the Standing Rock Indian Reservation next Friday, June 13th. Sources familiar with the trip confirm it to KFGO News. This will be the first visit to North Dakota by the President since he was elected.
The President has supported a number of initiatives aimed at helping Native Americans. He's signed the Tribal Law & Order Act to address the high crime rate on reservations.
Historians say it's unusual for a president to travel to reservations. In 1999 President Clinton visited the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, the first visit since President Franklin Roosevelt visited a North Carolina reservation in 1936.
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WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama says he'll visit a Native American reservation in North Dakota next week on his first trip to Indian Country as president. Obama says he and first lady Michelle Obama will visit the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in Cannonball. He says the reservation holds a special place in U.S. history because Chief Sitting Bull lived there. Obama says he's worked to strengthen justice, infrastructure and health care for Native Americans. But he also laments high Indian poverty rates and says he wants to hear firsthand about their challenges. He'll announce new initiatives during the visit to grow Indian economies. Obama visited the Crow Nation in Montana reservation as a presidential candidate, but hasn't been back to Indian country since. He vowed last year to return in 2014.