The chairwoman credited films such as “Killers of the Flower Moon,” for chronicling a long history of violence targeting Indigeous women.
"The cruel reality is that we continue to have a crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous people, and it is especially acute for women and girls in tribal communities,” Rosenworcel said.
The commission will soon begin hearing public comments on how to create the alerts designed for people older than 17.
The new warning system was heralded by other federal officials, including U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and Attorney General Merrick Garland.
Haaland, an Indigenous woman from New Mexico, is the first Native woman to serve as a cabinet secretary.
“Addressing violent crimes against Indigenous peoples has long been underfunded and ignored, as a cause of intergenerational trauma that has affected our communities since colonization,” Haaland said in a statement.
States including Washington, California and Colorado have their own internal warning systems for endangered and missing Indigenous adults.
