BIA here means the Bureau of Indian Affairs, an office of the United States government (under the Department of the Interior). It is the part of the government that has long handled official business with Native American tribes: land, money held for tribes, some schools, and government-to-government talks. The name still uses Indian in the older US legal sense — Native American / American Indian — which many people now find dated, but it is the bureau’s real name. In US history and news, BIA is a formal abbreviation. The office has a hard past: for many years it tried to control tribes rather than listen, including boarding schools that took children from their families. Native leaders have protested the BIA for a long time. Other things can share the letters BIA; this entry is that bureau.