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Michigan Department of Civil Rights shelved $1.1M tribal boarding-school report and omitted its apology recommendation

Bridge Michigan reported on January 21, 2026 that Michigan's Department of Civil Rights had shelved a $1.1 million report on the state's role in Native American tribal boarding schools, completed in October 2025 by Washington-based consulting firm Kauffman and Associates, rather than release it to the public. Kauffman said the department and the Attorney General's office, serving as its legal counsel, directed the firm to cut its initial 350-page report to 50 pages and remove references to local government involvement. A follow-up House hearing in late February found the department had also omitted the report's recommendations, including a recommended state apology, from the 16-page summary it gave the Legislature.

Jurisdiction
Michigan
Location
Lansing, Michigan

Abuses documented

Actors

  • Michigan Department of Civil Rights

Bridge Michigan reported on January 21, 2026 that Michigan's Department of Civil Rights had finished a $1.1 million report on the state's historical role in Native American tribal boarding schools -- commissioned in 2022, completed in October 2025 by Washington-based consulting firm Kauffman and Associates -- but declined to release it to the public. Kauffman and Associates CEO Kevin Keefe said the firm was directed to cut its initial 350-page report to 50 pages and to eliminate references to potential local-government involvement in the schools' operation. Department of Civil Rights Executive Director John Johnson Jr. said the report was "difficult to read" and "lacked the substance" needed for release. Civil Rights Commission member Regina Gasco, formerly chairperson of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians, said of the report's prospects: "It sounds to me like it is just going to be put on the shelf with dust on it."

Attorney General Dana Nessel separately announced in December 2025 that her office would open its own investigation into the impact of Native boarding schools in Michigan.

Updates

2026-02-26 — House hearing found the legislative summary omitted the apology recommendation [4]

A House Appropriations General Government Subcommittee heard testimony from Kauffman and tribal leaders on why the report was withheld. Kauffman testified that Attorney General's office representatives, serving as legal counsel to the Department of Civil Rights, gave her firm directives during the project that further narrowed its scope -- including removing a planned tribal advisory group and subject-matter experts, deleting references to children sent to boarding schools outside Michigan, and cutting survivor-descendant testimony -- concerns Kauffman said her firm had documented in an August 2025 letter to the Attorney General's office, the Department of Civil Rights, and the Governor's office. Reporting around the hearing found that the 16-page summary the department ultimately gave the Legislature, drawn from the completed 300-page report, omitted its recommendations entirely, including a recommended gubernatorial executive-order apology recognizing the state's "deliberate participation in the national policy of Native American boarding schools." Rep. Tom Kuhn (R-Troy), the subcommittee chair, said the Department of Civil Rights declined to testify, citing potential litigation with Kauffman and Associates; the department did not respond to press requests for comment. A spokesperson for the Attorney General's office disputed characterizations of its role as improper, saying its involvement was limited to legal counsel for the Department of Civil Rights.

2026-03 — State released redacted version of the report after hearing pushback [5, 6]

Following the hearing, the Department of Civil Rights released a redacted version of the previously shelved report, with redactions concentrated in survivor and descendant personal accounts. Tribal leaders said the release did not resolve their accountability concerns; Keefe said the firm stood by its research and called for release of the complete, unredacted report.

Why we recorded this

Michigan commissioned a $1.1 million study specifically to document the state's own role in the abuse and deaths of Native American children at boarding schools, so the state's decision to withhold the finished report -- and, as later reporting found, to strip its central recommendation, a state apology, out of the summary sent to lawmakers -- kept the public and the Legislature from seeing findings the state itself paid to produce. This archive records the suppression because a government commissioning an accounting of its own historical wrongdoing, then hiding what that accounting found, denies survivors and the public the transparency the report's own purpose required.

Sources

  1. Michigan spent $1.1M probing tribal boarding schools, then buried the results — Bridge Michigan investigative accessed August 10, 2026
  2. Michigan spent $1.1M probing tribal boarding schools, then buried the results — Interlochen Public Radio investigative accessed August 10, 2026
  3. Michigan tribal boarding school report sought apology. Instead, it was shelved — Bridge Michigan (via Charkoosta News) investigative accessed August 9, 2026
  4. Michigan lawmakers, Tribal leaders question Native boarding school report withheld by the state — Michigan Advance investigative accessed August 9, 2026
  5. Tribes push for accountability after release of boarding school report — 9&10 News (WWTV/WWUP) investigative accessed August 9, 2026
  6. After Scrutiny, Michigan Moves to Release Redacted Native Boarding School Report — Native News Online investigative accessed August 9, 2026

See also