New Honor the Earth Executive Director Statement

Dearest Relatives,

It is with both great heaviness and optimism that we move into a transition of responsibilities, after Winona LaDuke’s establishment and leadership of this organization for over 30 years. I am reaching out to you today as the sole Executive Director of Honor the Earth.

I came onboard to Honor the Earth in December 2022, joining other members of a newly formed leadership team, who are working to create fundamental changes to the organization to prepare Honor The Earth for the next 30 years of work. The timeline for the transitional leadership plan, under which I was originally brought into the organization, has obviously escalated in light of Winona LaDuke’s resignation. The next few months especially will be ones of intense changes, learning and growing for us as leadership, management, staff, and our organization as a whole.

I believe that it can be done in a good way. My goal for this next iteration of Honor the Earth is to create a firm, principled, standard for our work, internally and externally, that will help us meet the needs of our People, communities and our Mother Earth.

We have learned real lessons and want nothing more than this to be an example to other organizations about the deep work our communities, organizations, collectives, and movement spaces still have to do around sexual harassment. The movement is in a moment of moving away from allowing these types of behaviors to further traumatize our people. For far too long, it has not been taken seriously in our communities, especially those rife with the generational traumas that came out of the experiences in Boarding Schools. Honor The Earth is committed to the listening, healing and the intentional work ahead.

A crucial part of this transition will be the intentional investment in our relationships with each other and with our partners. I encourage open communication between us in order to create a good foundation and engage in transformative justice for us all moving forward. I also want to build on the profound contributions of Honor the Earth and dedicate our future commitments to the frontline efforts of dismantling the fossil fuel industry and to creating the alternatives and solutions for a just and sustainable future.

I have so much gratitude to those who have reached out, offered space and intention for conversation, and also their support, to move forward in a good way. We are looking forward to our work ahead for the next 30 years. 

Néa’eše

Krystal Two Bulls

Executive Director, Honor the Earth