By Chad Brown, Founder of Love Is King
I’ve just returned from Vasharii K’oo, Alaska — a place where the land breathes story and the people move with ceremony. I was honored to witness and participate in the Emergency Gwich’in Gathering, where every chief, elder, and community members comes together in sacred unity. It was not just a meeting. It was a reckoning. A spiritual convergence. A moment of truth.
The Gwich’in Nation — the Caribou People — are facing an existential threat. The Trump administration has moved forward with plans to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development, beginning with the 1002 Area. But this isn’t just a parcel of land. It is the birthplace of the Porcupine caribou herd. It is where life begins.
To the Gwich’in, this place is not called 1002. It is called Iizhik Gwats’an Gwandaii Goodlit — The Sacred Place Where Life Begins. The caribou are not just animals. They are kin. They are woven into the spiritual, cultural, and physical survival of the Gwich’in people. To drill here is to desecrate a living story that stretches back thousands of years.
Left to right: Soloman Ibe (Board Member, Love Is King), Chad Brown (Founder, Love Is King), Dr. Lisa Collins (Leader, Love Is King – Educator, Author The Truth About Trauma: Break Patterns, Build Resilience…)
I stood in solidarity with the Gwich’in Nation, alongside fellow advocates from Love Is King and many others who journeyed to this sacred land. We did not come to observe. We came to listen. To witness. To commit. Some people see ceremony and move on. Others feel it in their bones — and are changed.
I carry my own scars into this work. I am a United States Navy veteran. I’ve served in two wars. I’ve seen what man can do to man. I’ve seen the silence that greets many veterans when we return home. Patriotism may wave in the air, but it doesn’t always land on those who’ve borne its cost. My path has been marked by loss, pain, and the quiet unraveling of spirit.
But healing came when I met a Native American elder from the Quinault Indian Nation. He told me, “When a warrior comes home broken, it is the community that heals him.” That truth changed me. It reminded me that land, ceremony, and community are not luxuries — they are medicine.
The Native peoples of this land carry a spiritual commitment to place that many Americans have never felt. Yet they are the original stewards of this country. If “God and country” is a phrase tied to patriotism and faith — then let that God and that country sit down with the Gwich’in Nation. Let them listen. Let them learn.
This blog is not just a reflection. It is a message to the Trump administration:
You are invited into conversation. Not confrontation. Not performance. But truth.
I extend this invitation with love and clarity — to sit in circle with myself, the Chief of Arctic Village, and the tribal administration. Come to the land. Hear the stories. Witness the ceremony. Understand what is at stake.
This blog is not just a reflection. It is a message to the Trump administration:
You are invited into conversation. Not confrontation. Not performance. But truth.
I extend this invitation with love and clarity — to sit in circle with myself, the Chief of Arctic Village, and the tribal administration. Come to the land. Hear the stories. Witness the ceremony. Understand what is at stake.
This is also an invitation to the world. Share this message. Amplify the voices of the Gwich’in. Protect the Arctic Refuge. Not for politics. Not for profit. But for the sacred.
We must act — by any means necessary — to ensure that The Sacred Place Where Life Begins is not where life ends.
Because diversity is strength. Ceremony is resistance. And good trouble is the work that heals.
Dear President Trump,
I write to you not as a Republican, not as a Democrat, not as a liberal. I write to you as a United States Navy veteran. I’ve served in two wars. That alone is enough to establish my citizenship and my place in this nation — a nation built by the hands of slaves and soldiers, Black veterans, White veterans, Hispanic veterans, Native American veterans. Men and women who carried this country forward with blood, sacrifice, and silence.
And I am writing to you about the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Many Americans will never see this land. They will never feel its wind, walk its tundra, or witness the caribou migration. They will go off assumptions. But assumptions are not truth. The truth is: there are people in the Arctic. Indigenous people. The Gwich’in Nation. They are the Caribou People. Their lives are woven into the land through ceremony, story, and survival.
The Arctic Refuge is sacred. It is the canary in the coal mine. If we fail to protect it, the domino effect will ripple across ecosystems, communities, and generations. The Gwich’in understand this. They have their hand on the dial of nature — the dial of life and death. They read the wind, the rain, the sun, and the storm. There is a higher learning here, one that America desperately needs.
I know this may sound far off. Maybe even over your head. But I trust that if you open one door — just one — to sit in circle with the Chief of Arctic Village, the tribal administration, or even myself, we could begin a conversation. Not a confrontation. A conversation about coexistence. About balance. About protecting a nation that has lived in harmony with the land for thousands of years.
The selling of this land is not just policy. It is the dismantling of a human race that lives in the Arctic. It is the unraveling of Iizhik Gwats’an Gwandaii Goodlit — The Sacred Place Where Life Begins. Government calls it the 1002 Area. But to the Gwich’in, it is the womb of the caribou. The cradle of life.
I believe in good work. I believe in good trouble. And I believe in the power of conversation to prevent destruction.
I invite you to sit down. To listen. To learn. To lead differently.
With respect,
Chad Brown
Founder, Love Is King
Director, Freedom to ROAM
United States Navy Veteran
