First Nations in Quebec largely absent from election as Kahnawake rejects provincial politics

Most Indigenous communities in Quebec view provincial elections as happening in a foreign land, and their turnout reflects that distance. In the 2022 provincial election, Élections Québec estimated turnout in Kahnawà:ke at less than one per cent. Across Indigenous communities, the turnout was just under 15 per cent—compared with 66 per cent province-wide.

In Kahnawake, the Mohawk community across the river from Montreal, fewer than one percent of residents voted in 2022. The community sends a clear message: election posters appear on the street and are swiftly removed. A video posted online appears to show a man using a sledgehammer to knock down wooden stakes holding a Parti Québécois campaign sign at the Kahnawake outskirts.

"We don't want to participate or be involved in (the elections) in any way, nor do we want it to be right in our face," said Cody Diabo, Grand Chief of the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake. The principle underlying that stance is the Two-Row Wampum, a 1613 peace agreement between the Haudenosaunee confederacy and Dutch representatives.

"It would be us and the colonial governments, and it was supposed to be that we would be occupying the same lane, moving forward but never interacting," Diabo told the source. "That's why we don't participate in elections, and all that but what we see with legislation and all that is that they continually jump into our lane."

The pattern holds elsewhere. Akwesasne, in the southwestern part of the province, had no voters cast ballots in the 2022 provincial election. Wendake, in the Quebec City region, saw higher turnout tied to different governance dynamics.

Francis Verreault-Paul, chief of the Assembly of the First Nations Quebec-Labrador, which represents 43 communities, did not complete his quoted statement in available material.