By Charles Longshore / For The Herald
As a Native American serving a long sentence in Washington’s prison system, I have lived for decades with the knowledge that for Native people there is no path home.
No matter how hard someone works to rebuild their life, Native people have been left serving excessive sentences under laws the state now admits were wrong. For people sentenced when they were young, and for those whose cases would receive far shorter terms today, Washington offers no established process to evaluate who they have become or the work they have done to earn a second chance.
This legacy of hopelessness is laid bare in the heart-breaking deaths of seven Native people who died by suicide in Washington prisons over the past six years. People we call our relatives. When you consider that Native people are incarcerated at six times the rate of white Washingtonians, it is perhaps not surprising that the weight of these policy-driven disparities falls hardest on Indigenous people and people of color. Washington is often described as a progressive state, but for Native people serving long and life sentences, progress never reaches us.
This is why House Bill 1125, now before Washington legislators, is a necessary step toward addressing the harm caused by decades of extreme sentencing. The bill would allow review of a person’s sentence after they have served at least ten years and demonstrated substantial evidence of rehabilitation. Eligibility is not automatic; it must be earned, and it doesn’t guarantee release. It simply allows a person’s growth, healing and hard work to be considered, with priority given to older people, those with serious or terminal medical conditions, and people sentenced as children or young adults to extraordinarily long terms.
For those of us who have spent years living without any possibility of earning a way back to our communities, HB 1125 presents an opportunity rarely found in our system: hope.
For Native people, the need for hope is especially urgent. According to data from the Washington Office of Public Defense, Native Americans make up roughly 1 percent of the state’s population, yet account for 7 percent of the people in its prisons; a disparity driven by decades of over-policing, sentence enhancements and longer sentences imposed on Native youth and young adults. If every eligible Native person received the maximum relief, our communities would regain more than 1,000 years of life that would otherwise be spent behind bars.
These are not abstract numbers. They represent parents, siblings and young people sentenced under laws the state no longer defends, waiting decades for lawmakers to acknowledge the harm those laws have caused; separation from our lands, erosion of our cultures, and the loss of lives rooted in Tribal communities that have existed for thousands of years.
In October, the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians (ATNI), representing more than 50 sovereign Nations, passed Resolution 2025-48 calling for the passage of HB 1125. Tribal leaders named the ongoing dehumanization of Indigenous people in Washington’s criminal legal system and recognized that nearly half of the state’s prison population is serving life or long sentences with no mechanism for review. They highlighted higher rates of police use of force, felony sentencing and incarceration imposed on Native people, and honored the voices of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated Indigenous relatives who testified before the Washington state Supreme Court about intergenerational trauma.
ATNI called on the Legislature, the governor, the attorney general, and the judiciary to support HB 1125. Tribes across the Northwest made a unified and unequivocal assertion that second chances are not merely a policy preference; they are a matter of survival, cultural preservation, sovereignty and justice. This resolution is not symbolic. It reflects generations of Native people locked away from their families, culture and lands while politicians in Olympia debate whether fairness is worth the effort.
Gov. Bob Ferguson recently signed an executive order pledging stronger partnership with Tribal Nations. That commitment must be measured in action—by whether elected officials choose to stand with Native communities at a moment when punitive policies are spreading across the country. Too often, lawmakers who champion progressive values on issues like climate and affordability retreat into outdated tough-on-crime postures when the conversation turns to criminal legal reform, fearing political backlash.
But this moment demands more than caution. It demands the courage and leadership Washingtonians expect from their elected officials. By passing HB 1125, state leaders can show that justice is defined not by fear, but by fairness; and that hope still has a place in our laws.
Charles Longshore is a member of the Skokomish Tribe, an organizer for I Did the Time, and the Washington Co-Empathy Network Lead for Dream.org.
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