NAGA and MAGA are flocking together.
A group of anti-woke Native Americans is “gravely concerned” that a Long Island school stripping its Thunderbirds team name sends “a dangerous message” — and their threatening to slap them with a lawsuit over it.
Representatives for the national Native American Guardians Association sent a damning letter to the embattled Connetquot School District — its long-held school nickname and logo are on the chopping block — while a legal battle rages over New York state’s controversial 2023 ban on indigenous imagery and phrases.
“Compliance with this regulation is not ‘progress’; it is cultural censorship and systemic racism,” the NAGA letter, sent days before the beginning of the school year, read.
It added that whitewashing the “historic” name “would also commit the district to false and discriminatory representations about Native American culture.”
“Far from being derogatory, ‘Thunderbirds’ reflect strength, resilience, and heritage,” the letter continued.
On a wing and a prayer
The issue reached a fever pitch this summer as Connetquot, which initially sued the Board of Regents to keep the Thunderbirds moniker, quietly allocated over $23 million for rebranding under a new team name.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon — who ruled in May that only removing icons relevant to one ethnicity is a discriminatory civil rights violation — launched a federal probe into the Long Island district in July.
McMahon said “it is a top priority” of the Trump administration to keep Thunderbirds and other Native American team names like the nearby Massapequa Chiefs in a statement to The Post last week.
“We will not allow New York education leaders to continue violating the Civil Rights Act by inconsistently and unlawfully deeming some national-origin-based mascots as acceptable while determining others are not,” she added.
New York and Connetquot proposed a backroom deal to condense the name to T-Birds — a nickname already in use by the school and also initially included in the state’s ban — in exchange for the district tossing its lawsuit.
But NAGA is prepared to sue the school district if the deal is ironed out.
“Such action is sad and disgraceful, and we are ready to take immediate legal action if the board signs this agreement,” the group wrote of the “illegal and immoral” compromise.
“The District’s own filings in court have repeatedly acknowledged the Native origins of the Thunderbirds,” the group, which has taken other legal action against New York’s ban, added.
That won’t fly
Connetquot board member Jacquelyn DiLorenzo fumed at a recent public meeting that her colleagues had been committing “blatant corruption” by sidelining parents and community members from talks.
A majority of them vocalized a desire to keep pushing for Thunderbirds in several recent surveys the district administered, according to DiLorenzo.
“At a minimum, 60% of the people want us to continue to fight,” she told The Post.
“We keep asking and keep getting the same results.”
She also blasted the hypocrisy of the state, which first found T-Birds offensive to suddenly acceptable after feeling the heat from the feds.
Recently retired board member Jaclyn Napolitano-Furno, who has filed her own lawsuit to reinstate the Thunderbirds name, condemned the school board for scoffing at McMahon’s findings of a Title VI violation.
“Are you all essentially saying F-U to the President of the United States, Donald Trump?” she fumed while speaking at a public meeting last week.
“In direct defiance of the Trump Admin, this board continues to push a backroom deal with the state to comply with this discriminatory regulation.”
After pressure from voices like DiLorenzo and Napolitano-Furno — both moms with kids in the school system — Connetquot agreed to hold a public forum on the logo this Thursday.
President Trump also sounded off on the issue, recently telling Massapequa’s Brian Kilmeade on his “One Nation” radio show, “The state is fighting us very hard.”
“But I think we’ll be successful with it.”
