Margaret Commodore, a Canadian politician and Yukon MLA from 1982 to 1996, died on June 1, 2026.
She was born in 1932 in Chilliwack, British Columbia, and served in the Yukon Legislative Assembly for Whitehorse North Centre from 1982 to 1992 and Whitehorse Centre from 1992 to 1996. A member of the Yukon New Democratic Party, she held cabinet posts under the Tony Penikett government, including minister of health and human resources from 1986 to 1989.
In 1985, she became the first First Nations woman appointed to a cabinet in Canada, and from 1989 to 1992 she served as the country’s first Aboriginal minister of justice. Commodore, a member of the Sto:lo Nation, later testified before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada in 2013 about her experiences at residential school.