NEW TOWN, N.D. (AP) — On a recent chilly fall morning, Ruth De La Cruz walked through the Four Sisters Garden, looking for Hidatsa squash. To college students in her food sovereignty program, the crop might be an assignment. But to her, it is the literal fruit of her ancestors' labor.

“There’s some of the squash, yay,” De La Cruz exclaimed as she finds the small, pumpkinlike gourds catching the morning sun.

The garden is named for the Hidatsa practice of growing squash, corn, sunflower and beans — the four sisters — together, De La Cruz said. The program is part of the Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish College, operated by the Mandan Hidatsa Arikara Nation.

It is one of more than three dozen tribal colleges and universities across the country that the Trump administration proposed cutting funding t

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