The organization based its name on the racist slur “Redskins” and also abandoned the logo that was closely associated with this name: the profile of an Indian with long hair and two feathers.

Now a white Republican U.S. senator from Montana is reigniting the debate by blocking a bill that would fund the revitalization of the dilapidated RFK Stadium for the Commanders, who play miles away in Maryland. Senator Steve Daines says he will block the bill until the NFL and the Commanders honor the former logo in some form.

Daines declined to be interviewed by The Associated Press to explain his position or respond to criticism from indigenous peoples who attribute such efforts to racism.

The complicated history of Logo

The original logo was designed by a member of the Blackfeet Nation in Montana, and some tribal members are proud of it and the legacy of the man who helped design it in the early 1970s – Walter “Blackie” Wetzel, former tribal chairman of the Blackfeet Nation and former president of the National Congress of the American Indian, the oldest advocacy group for Native Americans and Alaska Natives in the country.

Wetzel's family says there was a friendship between Daines and Wetzel's son Don, who died last year at age 74, which may be fueling the senator's fight for the logo.

The issue of Indian land is usually a bipartisan issue in Congress.

Daines serves on the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs and has worked with his Democratic colleagues to provide clean water to indigenous communities. He supported the passage of a Truth and Healing Commission to examine the history of Indian boarding schools, legislation introduced by Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat from Massachusetts.

Daines also used this policy area to take swipes at the Biden administration and was one of the fiercest opponents of the nomination of Deb Haaland, the first Native American to head the Department of the Interior.

He accused her of being hostile to the energy and natural resources industries and said she would use the appointment to “negatively impact the way of life in Montana.” In May, he blocked the nomination of the woman seeking to become Montana's first Native American federal district judge. Daines said the Biden administration did not consult his office on the nomination, a claim the White House denies.

Painful symbolism?

Daines said in a prepared statement that he would hold up the stadium legislation until representatives of the Washington Commanders and the NFL demonstrate that they are working with the Wetzel family and Blackfeet Nation leaders to find a way to “honor the history of the logo and the heritage of our tribal nations and re-establish the organization as an advocate for Indian Country.”

For many indigenous peoples, the team's original name and logo represent an ugly history of racial discrimination and violence, as well as modern struggles over the ethical representation of Native Americans in popular culture. The National Congress of the American Indian, the organization once led by Walter Wetzel, has fought to abolish such mascots since 1968. Numerous psychological studies have shown the harmful effects that Native American mascots have on children.

A divided family

The mascot of the football team founded in Boston in 1932 was a Native American. However, after moving to Washington DC in 1937, the logo was changed first to a spear and later to an “R” decorated with two feathers.

Walter Wetzel had worked for the Department of Labor to address housing and employment inequalities in Indian Country. He worked closely with President John F. Kennedy and was friends with him and Robert Kennedy. Wetzel worked with the football team to redesign its logo. He felt that if the team was going to have a Native American-themed mascot, it should at least be a representative image, said his grandson Ryan Wetzel.

Walter Wetzel proposed a profile of a former Blackfeet chief, John Two Guns White Calf. An image of this image would be used from the 1972 season until its retirement in 2020.

“I understand the controversy around the name, I get it,” said Ryan Wetzel. “I come from a family that is divided about the name. But how can we keep the logo and use it going forward?”

Ryan Wetzel said his father, Don, had to have a leg amputated in his final years, but he still showed up regularly on Capitol Hill to garner support for preserving the logo, and Daines took up the cause. Daines reached out to Ryan Wetzel after his father's death last year to see if he could help somehow revive the effort to restore the logo.

A “dog whistle”?

A spokesman for Daines said discussions with the Washington Commanders about a way to honor the Wetzel family are ongoing and productive. In his testimony during a May committee hearing on the RFK Stadium bill, Daines suggested the logo could be revived to sell merchandise and a portion of the profits could be used for causes such as the epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women.

But Native American advocates and researchers say using the old logo is an inappropriate and harmful way to achieve justice and equality for Indigenous peoples. No matter how the image was chosen, it cannot be separated from the racist slur it once promoted, said Crystal Echo Hawk, a member of the Pawnee Nation and founder and CEO of IllumiNative, a nonprofit that advocates for greater visibility of Native Americans. She called the former logo a “dog whistle” for the team's former name.

“The science underscores the damaging impact of these images on indigenous peoples,” said Dr. Stephanie Fryberg, a professor of psychology at the University of Michigan and one of the country’s leading experts on the subject.

Fryberg, a member of the Tulalip Tribe in Washington state, said the use of these mascots leads to increased rates of depression, self-harm, substance abuse and suicidal thoughts, especially among children.

“The continued use of these racist images prevents Native Americans from existing and being valued in today’s societal context,” she said.

What did the Blackfeet Nation get?

In Montana, some Blackfeet Nation council members wonder why so little of the millions of dollars raised by the football team featuring the White Calf image, designed by a former Blackfeet Nation chairman, never reached the Blackfeet people.

Decades ago, the football team donated a few vans to transport Blackfeet elders to a nearby VA facility, said Blackfeet Nation councilman Everett Armstrong, but he was unaware of any other resources or revenue shared with the tribe. A spokesman for the Washington Commanders could not provide other examples but said the team was in talks with the Wetzel family.

There are strong feelings about the logo and its legacy on the reservation, Armstrong said. But one group feels completely excluded from the discussion: the descendants of White Calf.

They were not consulted about the use of his image in the 1970s and have never been asked about it since, said Armstrong, himself a descendant of White Calf.

“They want a seat at the table,” he said.