In response to Berkeley’s Indigenous Peoples’ Day in place of Columbus day, Yale raised awareness of the holiday’s brutal origin and history in 2009.

U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, a Democrat, was elected to represent New Mexico in the Senate in 2008 after serving five terms in the U.S. House. He also had served as the state’s attorney general.

Read an article about how Berkeley changed the Columbus Day holiday into Indigenous Peoples’ Day in 1992, after the city declared Columbus not a hero. 

U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., is U.S. Senate majority leader and a member of the LDS church.

U.S. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, is a member of the LDS church.

U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., was appointed to the Senate in May 2011 to fill the vacancy left by Sen. John Ensign’s resignation. Heller previously represented Nevada’s 2nd District in the U.S. House, and before that, he served many years in state government.

U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, is a member of the LDS church who has run for president. In the 2000 presidential primaries, he encountered anti-Mormon sentiment in the Midwest and ultimately withdrew from the race.

U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, is a member of the LDS church.

Montana, in addition to Columbus Day, celebrates American Indian Heritage Day on the fourth Friday of September. Read a column published Sept. 23, 2005, by the Billings Gazette.