THREAD: Deep within Arizona’s Sonoran Desert and less than 100 yards from the international border, Quitobaquito Springs has been part of the Native O’odham People’s ancestral lands and a sacred ceremonial site for thousands of years. 🌿 
It is also the only U.S. home of the endangered Sonoyta mud turtle and the Quitobaquito pup fish.
⚠️Today, Quitobaquito Springs is at risk of being destroyed. ⚠️
⚠️Today, Quitobaquito Springs is at risk of being destroyed. ⚠️
“The land is being ripped open to start building this border wall,” says @seukteomaaa, a member of the Tohono O’odham Nation who has spent years resisting border wall construction on Indigenous homelands. “Plants are being ripped from the ground. Animals are being endangered.”
⛔️ With waivers to bypass environmental laws, the federal government is now drilling wells to steal water from the region’s aquifer—which feeds the springs—all for disruptive activities like mixing cement and wetting down dusty roads. ⛔️
But the fight against the border is not new. “We’ve been split in half.” Visiting O’odham family on the other side, as well as access to ceremonial and grave sites, is now even more uncertain. Some wildlife, too, will no longer be able to make traditional migrations. ⬇️
”Being allowed to use traditional crossings along the border—and it’s disgusting that I have to use the word ‘allowed,’ because it’s our homeland—is a concern,” @seukteomaaa says. “I still have no words for how it makes me feel that a government can let ancestors’ graves ...
"Be desecrated and ripped through for a border wall that makes no sense, that is killing animals, that is committing genocide on the species of the land, on the plants, on the people and our cultures and traditions, our languages and our ceremonies.” ‼️
⚡️To learn more about O’odham resistance to the border wall and ways to help, follow '@DefendOodhamJewed' on Instagram. ⚡️
