The challenge of connecting a Native reservation with borders crossing Canada and the US

On this episode of Connected Nation, we continue our coverage from the Broadband Nation Expo taking place in Orlando, Florida. And we're doing so by telling a story from Montana, one of two tribes, two nations, and the effort to connect an entire reservation across borders. 

Coming Thursday, April 2, 2026:  register for the Virtual Town Hall Meeting 

Recommended links: 

Fort Belknap Indian Community

Donald Long Knife LinkedIn

You’re invited to join Connected Nation’s experts on Thursday, April 2 for a special virtual town hall meeting that explores what’s happening with high-speed internet across the country. Register here: bit.ly/BroadbandFutures

Transcript

Jessica Denson (00:07):

On this episode of Connected Nation, we continue our coverage from the Broadband Nation Expo taking place in Orlando, Florida. And we're doing so by telling a story from Montana, one of two tribes and unique language, and the effort to connect an entire reservation. I'm Jessica Denson and this is Connected Nation. 

I'm at the Broadband Nation Expo taking place in Orlando, Florida, and I was walking around the exhibit hall looking at the different booths, and I went to the, uh, this fiber training school, and Donald Long Knife was there, and I asked him, please, please, will you come talk to me on the podcast? He is with the Fort Belknap Indian Community. Donald, thank you for agreeing to join me, <laugh>.

Donald Long Knife (00:51):

You're welcome. Yeah, I appreciate this.

Jessica Denson (00:53):

I, I know you were, um, asking them about training. Why was that booth interesting to you?

Donald Long Knife (00:59):

Well, the reason why I was asking for about training is our tribal government. We are starting to do our build out with, uh, fixed wireless and fiber to the home for our whole reservation. I'm, I guess I'm the main guy that's kind of ram rotting the whole situation for our tribal government. 

And since we're starting our build out right now, um, I want to look for somebody that could at least help me train some of our, um, individuals here on the reservation, because we did put on a tribal broadband, uh, training one time Uhhuh over there, just to get the feel out of how many kids or adults that want to get into, you know, either fixed wireless or fiber and learn, uh, new technology,

Jessica Denson (01:45):

Uhhuh, <affirmative>.

Donald Long Knife (01:46):

And what happened was, I barely had maybe a handful of our own people that came and the hand out of the handful, it was a couple of our council members,

(01:58):

Uhhuh <affirmative>. So, you know, they just wanted to see what it was all about. So, and I was kind of glad they did. Um, so that's why I was over at that, uh, wanted to ask for some training. Um, I wanna bring some more people in because now that I'm doing my build out, I sure see a lot of people that want to come and help work on the build out and maybe work their way into a job. Mm-hmm. 

But, you know, having somebody without the experience is kind of difficult because we're actually doing hands on training then uhhuh, and we don't know how much they would retain because we're gonna be working fast, getting this build out going. 'cause once we get our, uh, first three towers up, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna start doing a microwave back haul on our towers so that I can start broadcasting our 2.5 gigahertz to fix to homes that are further out and who all want to get on our network.

Jessica Denson (02:49):

So talk a little bit about your reservation. How big is it? It, it's, um, it's gonna be Indian owned, right? Yes. Native. Native owned, which is awesome. Um, does that, that gives you more control over it. Talk about the reservation and why it's important for you to, to lead for the Indian Nation itself to lead in putting this broadband there.

Donald Long Knife (03:11):

Well, for our reservation, we're, we're so spread out that, uh, we don't have very good coverage. We have a local carrier there that says they have the coverage for us, but,

Jessica Denson (03:20):

But you don't?

Donald Long Knife (03:20):

No. Um, we don't.

Jessica Denson (03:21):

Yeah.

Donald Long Knife (03:22):

Um, and so what what, um, got me interested in this is because I wanted to be able to get our people that are further out that actually use our local carrier, and then they find out that, that it's not fast enough for 'em or it's not working for 'em. I want to be able to do that with our build out here. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. So I started doing this back in 2012, so I'm finally at the point where I could actually build out, um, before it was a little tough, especially when we had to do COVID,

Jessica Denson (03:50):

Uhhuh

Donald Long Knife (03:51):

Went through the COVID situation because when we did that, we had to work from home and with our local carrier, they didn't like it because we had families that had one that was going to college, one that was working for the tribal government, and then their kids that just wanted to play games. And so their, their system and they're all at home. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. 

Wasn't fast enough for 'em, even though they were getting a 25, um, speed, 25 meg coming through to their homes. And I think it was 10 meg up at the time. They, it wasn't working for 'em because they had to set times in their house to say, okay, you could do your college classes at this time and I'll do my work at this time and you could play your game.

Jessica Denson (04:34):

Yeah. That's a horrible choice to have to make.

Donald Long Knife (04:36):

It is, you know, for the families. So at the time I did, I asked the council if we, you know, for our employees, I want to go and network their houses because they do have the speed, but right now our local carriers only give 'em a, a router, a wireless router that says, oh yeah, this will connect to every device in your house. But they don't tell 'em that the bandwidth shrinks after 10 of them get on.

Jessica Denson (05:00):

Right.

Donald Long Knife (05:00):

You know, Uhhuh <affirmative>. And so they have the speed, they just didn't have the equipment. So I took a, you know, a better router to 'em or better switch

Jessica Denson (05:09):

Uhhuh <affirmative>.

Donald Long Knife (05:09):

And I plugged the router into that and I said, just use your wireless routers for your cell phones. Nothing else. Everybody else will be connected wireless or through the wired, hardwired. I said, then you'll get your speeds. I had a lot of our, um, employees liking that because they said, Hey, we didn't know it worked like this. I said, yeah, they don't tell you that. No <laugh>, they would rather tell you buy more megabits coming in at this price. And, you know, 50 megabytes at $200 a month is kind of expensive for a world that's

Jessica Denson (05:39):

Expensive.

Donald Long Knife (05:40):

Yeah. You know, and a lot of 'em are on fixed income, so it's kind of hard for them to live up to that. And then when they get it shut off, they have to go and spend $200 more just for a reconnect fee. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. So I don't want that for our people. I want our people to have high speed internet, you know, wirelessly or through the fiber mm-hmm <affirmative>. But basically do the fixed wireless for now until we get the fiber to the homes to work with.

Jessica Denson (06:05):

So will the, um, will the new system, the new network, will that be owned by Fort Belknap, um, Indian community?

Donald Long Knife (06:12):

Yes. It will. Uhhuh <affirmative> and, uh, what I'm calling it, uh, the name of it I'll show you here.

Jessica Denson (06:18):

Yeah. Let's see.

Donald Long Knife (06:19):

Um,

Jessica Denson (06:20):

Just so everybody knows, he's opening up a binder for me, a little side pocket.

Donald Long Knife (06:25):

And this is what I'm,

Jessica Denson (06:27):

Oh, I love it. It's like a lovely, um, uh, Indian blanket, would I say?

Donald Long Knife (06:31):

Well, no, this is actually a hand drum.

Jessica Denson (06:33):

Oh, that's really pretty.

Donald Long Knife (06:34):

When my dad was on the council uhhuh, um, for our tribe, when I was a teenager, uh, somebody gave him a hand drum because he helped their family out on the tribe. And so he had our local, uh, native, uh, painter paint this for him. That's beautiful. That is our, um, actually our, uh, what do you wanna call it? Um,

Jessica Denson (06:54):

Your symbol.

Donald Long Knife (06:54):

Yeah, that's our, your

Jessica Denson (06:55):

Logo. That's

Donald Long Knife (06:55):

Our, our logo for the tribe. And

Jessica Denson (06:57):

So its got these lovely feathers and a, a buffalo symbol, right?

Donald Long Knife (07:01):

Yep.

Jessica Denson (07:01):

Um, all around it. It's the blues and reds, it's Red Elk Communications. Right.

Donald Long Knife (07:06):

That's what I call it.

Jessica Denson (07:06):

Yeah.

Donald Long Knife (07:07):

And that's my father's in the name. It's called Hey, Hanu.

Jessica Denson (07:11):

Say it again.

Donald Long Knife (07:12):

Hey, Hanu.

Jessica Denson (07:13):

Uhhuh <affirmative>. Hey, Hanu.

Donald Long Knife (07:14):

Hey.

Jessica Denson (07:15):

Nu. And, and what does that means? Red El

Donald Long Knife (07:16):

Means red el.

Jessica Denson (07:17):

Oh, that's awesome.

Donald Long Knife (07:18):

And, uh, nowadays, uh, they, a lot of them call it, uh, hey Haga sha because they, uh, they're trying to teach our language back Uhhuh, <affirmative>. But see, when they teach colors, that's the Shah is the color of red. But he, hanu is actually the old saying of his name.

Jessica Denson (07:38):

Oh,

Donald Long Knife (07:38):

It's, it still means red, but it's, it's a different,

Jessica Denson (07:42):

It's beautiful. It's a beautiful word. Yeah. And that is something, I've talked to Indian communities before, native Nations before, and one of the things that I've heard is part of the reason to have that technology is to not only share the culture mm-hmm <affirmative>. Preserve the culture, but to extend it and continue it and grow it by doing so, would, would you feel the same? Or,

Donald Long Knife (08:07):

I'm glad you brought that up, because we are, we're actually looking at a data center, Uhhuh a data center to um, do this. And I'm trying to get all our reservations in the state of Montana. 

We have actually seven, um, where we would get a fiber line between all of them so that we could all be connected and show our, um, I guess our culture, our language, uh, teach people, you know, the different, um, tribes and how we address things, how we work toward things, uhhuh, and how we live, you know, from back in the histories to nowadays. You

Jessica Denson (08:42):

Know, I think that's wonderful. I think it's beautiful. And I also think, um, or at least I've, I, when I've talked to Native Nations, it's also a way to, you know, maybe make, make something that is from your culture, share it with the world, and even make money by sharing it with the world, by selling it. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. Or helping or getting it out there. It's a way to, to create business.

Donald Long Knife (09:04):

Yes. Um, 'cause like, what I'm hoping to do is that we'll be able to work with the universities

Jessica Denson (09:09):

And

Donald Long Knife (09:09):

Say, Hey, you want to learn about our culture? You wanna learn about our history? Here we are, you know, come enjoy what the Asino boy and the Grove wants do, and how they were brought into this world and where we came from and where we're going with all of this.

Jessica Denson (09:24):

It's very cool. Very cool. So, I, I neglected to say where, uh, Fort Belknap Indian community is located. Where, where is that located?

Donald Long Knife (09:33):

Well, it's located in, um, north central Montana. If you look at the map, right? Dead center in the North Central are only about maybe 40 miles

Jessica Denson (09:42):

Uhhuh,

Donald Long Knife (09:43):

Um, south of the Canadian border.

Jessica Denson (09:46):

I've recently talked to the Montana broadband director. Do you guys, do you interact with the state at all or is, I know you're a sovereign nation, but do you have a good relationship?

Donald Long Knife (09:56):

Um, I talked to a few of them over there. Uhhuh, uh, I've been trying to get them to, uh, help us with the bead program. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. But the problem with the bead and Montana and all that is, is we have, um, local carriers that already had their, um, phone lines. 

And you know, right now they all have fiber through there, uhhuh already, because they, they just follow the same path. So they didn't have to go through any, um, I guess stops on the way to say, Hey, we want to go through this again,

Jessica Denson (10:29):

Uhhuh <affirmative>.

Donald Long Knife (10:29):

And what that did was, um, they told us, well, for you guys to put in this application, since this local carrier already has fiber in there, um, we prefer you give the tribal money to them to better their service.

Jessica Denson (10:45):

Um,

Donald Long Knife (10:46):

And that hurts.

Jessica Denson (10:47):

That does hurt. I can understand that would hurt. Yeah. It doesn't because for one, there's, I don't wanna get to the muck too much, but there is a history of where tribes have been overlooked. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. Native Nations have been not, people have not been honest, the government hasn't always been honest. I know that there's some, there's a lot of pain there. 

So when you, then you have this <laugh> added on top of it, I can understand where you'd say, no, no, we're gonna keep this and we're going to own this and we're going to do this. Yep. So how exciting is it that you're now to the point where you're gonna put those towers up?

Donald Long Knife (11:22):

You know, I really am, I'm really excited about it because not for that we're gonna be actually connected to the world now. We're gonna have to us guys, we're gonna have the best speeds coming down and the best speeds going up rather than having, you know, say 25 meg coming down and only three meg going up. You know, that's kind of a delay in it. And especially if

Jessica Denson (11:41):

You're, it's barely email <laugh>. Yeah.

Donald Long Knife (11:43):

And, and if you're trying to run your own business, it's hard for them to do their businesses actually to get it out there.

Jessica Denson (11:49):

Mm-hmm <affirmative>.

Donald Long Knife (11:49):

Especially if they're doing a website. So there's a lot of things that I'm working on for our tribe that will better our reservation uhhuh. And we could actually go into the future and say, yeah, we're actually sovereign. We're building our own networks. We're building our own companies. That will build out to the people out there in the world

Jessica Denson (12:08):

And help generations. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, talk about some of the challenges of building there. Is it a very unique topography? Is, are there some challenges? Can you only build certain times a year?

Donald Long Knife (12:19):

Um, yes. There is. Like right now we just started doing our build out on uh, three towers right now.

Jessica Denson (12:25):

Mm-hmm <affirmative>.

Donald Long Knife (12:25):

Um, since it's starting to get cold now and the ground's starting to harden a little bit, that's gonna slow us down because, you know, the frost line actually goes down about four feet.

Jessica Denson (12:36):

Oh wow.

Donald Long Knife (12:37):

You know, and then when it freezes, it doesn't do any good to dig and it puts something in there because when it thaws it gets soft and, you know, temp,

Jessica Denson (12:44):

It's the foundation's no good then. Yeah. So

Donald Long Knife (12:46):

It's, it's really difficult to get started. But you know, we lived there all our lives, so we understand wind's a good time. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. And you know, if you're gonna use concrete, you have to at least have 50 degree weather.

Jessica Denson (12:59):

Yeah. Just

Donald Long Knife (12:59):

So it otherwise, 'cause I used to work in concrete before too. Uhhuh, <affirmative> and a little bit because I know when I was doing it and I worked in the wintertime, I had to keep heaters going in a tent just to cure it.

Jessica Denson (13:11):

Oh wow.

Donald Long Knife (13:12):

'cause it had to be above 50 degrees.

Jessica Denson (13:13):

Mm-hmm <affirmative>.

Donald Long Knife (13:14):

And you know, sitting out in the cold.

Jessica Denson (13:15):

That's <laugh>. That's tough. That's tough. So is that your background? You have always dealt in infrastructure or what brought you to doing this particular project or working in telecom?

Donald Long Knife (13:27):

Um, well when I got outta the service, I was working in technology

Jessica Denson (13:31):

Back there. So you served, where'd you serve? Don't, don't breeze over that. Thank you for that.

Donald Long Knife (13:35):

I was, um, I served in the army. Uh, I spent my whole tour over in Europe

Jessica Denson (13:40):

Oh wow.

Donald Long Knife (13:40):

In Germany.

Jessica Denson (13:41):

Oh wow.

Donald Long Knife (13:42):

And I worked with radars, uh, missiles and stuff like that.

Jessica Denson (13:47):

Well thank you for your service sir. Thank you.

Donald Long Knife (13:49):

And so when I got out, I was getting into the technology part of it and I noticed what we needed on our reservation. It was, we didn't have anything, you know, and so I started talking to the council. I started talking to all our people. Hey, what do you think if we de decided to design our own network here, our own internet? Um, I actually started our own tribal government's IT department

Jessica Denson (14:16):

Oh wow.

Donald Long Knife (14:16):

For, um, and that was back in 98. And

Jessica Denson (14:20):

So you've been doing it for a while. Yeah. You've earned your stripes.

Donald Long Knife (14:22):

Yeah. And it just happened one day. Um, our courts needed to have a server, um, network built

Jessica Denson (14:30):

Uhhuh

Donald Long Knife (14:30):

Back in 98. And I was just came home from uh, college, I went for electrical engineer and they asked me, Hey, can you build it? I said, yeah, that's no problem. I can do that <laugh>. So I did. And then our uh, police department was actually a, a mile away and they said, well, we don't want to have our people that come to court that's in jail to drive a mile, you know, because we just wanna make sure they're safe over there and not try to get away or whatever.

<laugh>, can you hook our network up there? So I said, okay. And back in, you know, I think it was like 2000, I did my very first point to point, um, wireless connection.

Jessica Denson (15:07):

Oh wow. Between buildings, uhhuh, <affirmative>,

Donald Long Knife (15:09):

And it worked. I got it to work into their network, but it was only just two buildings. And back then that was a big accomplishment.

Jessica Denson (15:16):

Yeah.

Donald Long Knife (15:16):

You know, and then I had our, uh, tribal, um, health, I think it was our tribal health, our social services that wanted it too. But they wanted to be connected into our deal. So I actually did another point to point with them there.

Jessica Denson (15:29):

Uhhuh. <affirmative>.

Donald Long Knife (15:29):

And then that started me getting me going to uh, point to multi-point with our different departments because they wanted to be on our phone network. They wanted to have internet and they didn't want to pay for all of that separately.

Jessica Denson (15:41):

Yeah.

Donald Long Knife (15:42):

And this way it was easier for me to connect all our whole tribal government. So now we actually do our own virtual servers and I also have every, we have maybe 30 to 40 programs.

Jessica Denson (15:55):

Mm-hmm <affirmative>.

Donald Long Knife (15:56):

And they all have their own VLAN connected to us now.

Jessica Denson (15:59):

So is Red Elk Communications really what you hope to be your legacy then, since you've been connecting the reservation for now since 2000 or 1998? Uh,

Donald Long Knife (16:09):

Not really My legacy, um, more or less, I'm kind of honoring it with my father. Uhhuh <affirmative>. He was on the council way back then and he's the one that told me, whenever you're working for the tribe, you do everything for the reservation. Awesome. You don't do nothing for yourself. It's the people out here. It's bigger than you that you have to serve.

Jessica Denson (16:29):

So I think that's wonderful.

Donald Long Knife (16:30):

So that's what I do it for. And you know, he's the one that put that thought in my brain and I said, okay, I'll run with it. I don't care. You know, <laugh> and I have my son and a couple other ones.

Jessica Denson (16:42):

Uhhuh

Donald Long Knife (16:42):

<affirmative> yourself up. I said, but this ain't about me.

Jessica Denson (16:46):

It's about the reservation. Yeah. Yeah. That, but that's wonderful 'cause you're doing a lot to help the entire tribe. Uh, I won't keep you all day, I promise. I know that I hear them plating lunch. We both wanna to eat. I know. But what do you hope in your perfect world happens in the next year, five years for Red Elk?

Donald Long Knife (17:05):

For Red Elk? I hope to have myself. Um, well within the three years besides having my network up and fully operational, I want to have a data center going for our reservation because I know I'm gonna have a lot of people coming to me and saying, Hey, you hooked this up, but we don't understand it. 

Okay. Well come on into my data data center. I have people here that'll help you understand what a router does, what a switch does in your home. You know, how you get the best, um, throughput on there. Um, we'll train you, teach you, and even come to your house when you have problems.

Jessica Denson (17:39):

So really empower people.

Donald Long Knife (17:40):

Yeah.

Jessica Denson (17:41):

Yeah. That's awesome. I need you to come over to my house and show me <laugh>. I work for Connected Nation and I'm, sometimes I'm like, I don't understand why this Route Rider thing's not working, what's going on, 

<laugh>. Yeah. Well, I really appreciate your time, Donald Long Knife who is with the Fort Belknap Indian community. I never gave your official title, but it is Indian Government IT specialist, correct? Yes. Yes. Thank you so much

Donald Long Knife (18:03):

For your time. And by the way, there's also two tribes. Oh, I'm a Nakota.

Jessica Denson (18:06):

Okay. Uh,

Donald Long Knife (18:07):

Bu and we also have the other tribe called Grove. Oh, they call themselves the An <inaudible> or something like that. I don't know how to say it.

Jessica Denson (18:14):

I love it when you educate me like that. What are the two tribes again?

Donald Long Knife (18:18):

Uh, sbo, I'm in the

Jessica Denson (18:19):

Sbo,

Donald Long Knife (18:20):

The Dakota. We're kind of out of the, the Sioux Nation. Uhhuh

Jessica Denson (18:23):

<affirmative>

Donald Long Knife (18:24):

Because there's a Dakota, the Dakota and the Dakota

Jessica Denson (18:27):

Uhhuh.

Donald Long Knife (18:27):

And that's what what I am. And then we have The Grove, um, that's the name the French gave them, but they, their actual name is, uh, the <inaudible>. I don't know how to say it, how to say it.

Jessica Denson (18:39):

So the language that you were speaking earlier, how do you, what's the language?

Donald Long Knife (18:43):

Abo language, like

Jessica Denson (18:45):

A vo?

Donald Long Knife (18:45):

If I come up to you, I'd tell you. Um huh. Kona,

Jessica Denson (18:50):

You know, that means, hi friend, how are you? Do I love that. It's a beautiful language. It's really beautiful. Um, if

Donald Long Knife (18:56):

I'm telling you who I am, I'm K

Jessica Denson (19:01):

Dai,

Donald Long Knife (19:01):

My name is K.

Jessica Denson (19:03):

So did, are there classes, where is that pass along? Still in the schools there?

Donald Long Knife (19:08):

Um, they're getting them Uhhuh <affirmative> to be in the schools right now. Uh, the way I grew up is, was a, was years in the home.

Jessica Denson (19:16):

In the home. Yeah.

Donald Long Knife (19:17):

Got it. And to me that was the only way everybody really understood your culture, Uhhuh is when you lived it.

Jessica Denson (19:25):

Yeah. And

Donald Long Knife (19:26):

I actually lived it because my mom was a full blood ass boy, and my dad was a full blood ass boy. And so I guess I'm, our family's one of the last, uh, full bloods in there.

Jessica Denson (19:35):

Oh, wow.

Donald Long Knife (19:35):

My, uh, daughter's, they're like all three quarters. Uhhuh <affirmative> because my wife, she's three quarters, um, ass boy and have a quarter robot in here. So we're, I guess you could say we're set to be as, uh, federally recognized.

Jessica Denson (19:49):

Uhhuh, <affirmative>,

Donald Long Knife (19:49):

You know, there's a lot that aren't, and it's kind of sad. And they're the ones that are wanting to learn our language and our culture, so

Jessica Denson (19:57):

Mm-hmm <affirmative>. Yeah. It's, um, native Nations. I, I think it's so fascinating. A lot of people make assumptions that there's just one or two mm-hmm <affirmative>. But there's hundreds, right?

Donald Long Knife (20:06):

Yep.

Jessica Denson (20:06):

Yeah, there's hundreds. And I think it's So please educate me. I'll take any opportunity. I think it's wonderful and I really thank you're wonderful and thank you for your time.

Donald Long Knife (20:15):

Thank you. I appreciate this.

Jessica Denson (20:19):

We'll continue our coverage from the Broadband Nation Expo on future episodes of Connected Nation. Until then, I'm Jessica Denson, and this is Connected Nation.