New national monument comes after more than a decade of advocacy by Native nations

A portion of Grand Canyon National Park and the newly designated Baaj Nwaavjo I'tah Kukveni – Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument (Ryan Heinsius/KNAU)

The new national monument in Arizona that President Biden is announcing today is primarily aimed at protecting Native American sacred sites on just fewer than a million acres of federally owned land. It's a reflection of his administration prioritizing goals of America's indigenous peoples.

There's only one tribe who actually lives inside the the Grand Canyon, the Havasupai, and they've been among the most outspoken of the more than dozen tribes in the area who have cultural and historic ties to the canyon. They've been pushing for land protections for decades, and banded together formally after President Obama issued a 20-year hold on new uranium mines in 2012.