Dear Supporter,
As the climate crisis worsens, it is clear that future generations are the ones who will suffer the most — and that indigenous peoples are on the frontlines of the climate crisis. That's why the Sierra Club supports organizations like SustainUS, a national youth-led organization advancing sustainability and environmental justice. SustainUS is helping empower indigenous young people and people of color to help shape a future that is free from systemic injustices like climate change, and is leading a delegation of indigenous youth to COP25, the 2019 UN Climate Change Conference.
Despite the fact that indigenous peoples protect 80% of the planet's biodiversity, their voices have been underrepresented on the world stage in general and in United Nations climate negotiations in particular. Until now.
This is an opportunity we cannot miss to elevate the voices of people who need to be heard on the world stage. Will you make a gift right now to send this youth delegation to the U.N. Climate Change Conference, and support all of SustainUS's vital work?
Help SustainUS reverse the culture of exclusion and erasure of indigenous people that has historically pervaded global climate conferences with a donation today. 100% of your gift will help SustainUS send a delegation to the 2019 UN Climate Change Conference and continue to amplify youth voices in the fight
against justice and the climate crisis.
Personally, I can't wait for world leaders to meet delegates like Orion , a self-proclaimed "queer visual storytelling educator, anticapitalist coalition-builder"...or Niria , a Xicana organizer and social media specialist who has led successful campaigns to protect communities from pesticide drift and restore endangered salmon runs... or Michael , who hails from the Navajo nation and works tirelessly to increase indigenous representation in climate activism, politics and higher education.
These three young people and their fellow SustainUS delegates are leaders and artists, visionaries and "solutionaries," and above all tireless changemakers who will take COP25 by storm. Together they'll bring a needed, culturally-informed perspective on climate science, and on the delicate balance between humans and the lands, waters, and other life forms.
As a committed believer in the Sierra Club's environmental justice mission, I know you're as excited as I am to support SustainUS' efforts to build a truly representative youth movement — one that can intervene at places of power to demand systemic change. Please show your solidarity with SustainUS and their efforts with a donation now.
Thank you for supporting SustainUS and their efforts to help young indigenous people "walk in the footsteps of their ancestors" — by demanding their sovereignty be recognized and their communities' needs met.
We're so grateful to you for rising to this challenge and promoting SustainUS' transformational work.
In solidarity,
Karissa Gerhke
National Director
Sierra Student Coalition | 