Massapequa Lawsuit Could Reshape National Mascot Debate

The Massapequa School District's challenge to New York's Native American mascot ban heads to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit November 4, with constitutional questions extending far beyond Long Island.

Andre Billeaudeaux, co-founder of the Native American Guardians Association, argues the state has embraced a fundamentally misguided movement to eliminate Indigenous names and symbols from American schools and sports.

"Our mission was to educate, not eradicate," said Billeaudeaux, a retired Coast Guard commander who served 30 years in uniform and subsequently worked with Navy SEALs.

The lawsuit challenges regulations adopted by New York's Board of Regents under Gov. Kathy Hochul and the Democrats controlling Albany.

Massapequa, whose Chiefs identity dates back approximately a century, faces potentially losing state funding if it refuses to comply. The district has estimated the cost of rebranding at nearly $1 million.

Billeaudeaux considers the mandate an outrageous waste of taxpayer money, particularly when schools must replace athletic uniforms, signs, gymnasium floors and other longstanding symbols.

"Redoing a basketball court's what, a quarter million dollars if you're lucky," he said.

The controversy has already attracted federal attention. The Trump administration's Department of Education determined in May 2025 that New York's policy violated federal civil rights protections by singling out Native American imagery while allowing other ethnic references.

Billeaudeaux points to national surveys disputing claims that Native Americans overwhelmingly oppose traditional team names. An Annenberg survey in 2004 and a Washington Post poll in 2016 both found that 90% of those surveyed were not offended by the Washington Redskins name.

For Billeaudeaux, the strongest example of historical erasure involves Blackfeet Chief John Two Guns White Calf, whose likeness inspired the former Washington Redskins helmet emblem. He’s also represented on the Indian Head nickel, also known as the Buffalo nickel, minted in the U.S. from 1913-1938.

Family representatives are now demanding the restoration of Chief John Two Guns White Calf’s image, which had appeared on Washington’s football helmets for decades before the franchise abandoned its Redskins name and logo in 2020.

"They were never consulted about the cancellation of the Redskin name," Billeaudeaux noted. "It just disappeared; that was it."

He also condemns Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass for her involvement in the political movement against Native American team names, accusing its supporters of promoting a distorted interpretation of Indigenous history.

Billeaudeaux finds particular irony in Washington's replacement name, Commanders, arguing it invokes the military commanders responsible for campaigns against Native American tribes, including the Blackfeet.

"The cavalry commanders that charged that hill and massacred all those Blackfeet, they were commanders from D.C.," he said.

He maintains the Massapequa battle is about more than mascots.

"This is national standard, 14th and 1st Amendment protections that every American's afforded, and they're being stepped on all over the place in this law," Billeaudeaux stressed.