[4] At the age of seven, he was among 27 Cree children taken from their homes to attend a French-language residential school in La Tuque, where he lived with an English-speaking Anglican family.

[6] After that, he attended a meeting on the negotiations between the Cree and government officials on constitutional and resource rights, which sparked his interest in pursuing a law degree.

On September 16, 2011, Saganash announced that he was running for the leadership of the NDP, to succeed Jack Layton, who had died the previous month.

[13] After an incident where he was removed from an Air Canada Jazz flight from Montreal to Val-d'Or for intoxication, Saganash took sick leave in October 2012 for the treatment of alcohol dependency.

Saganash cited the death of his "friend and mentor" Jack Layton, as well as the "profound scars" he received while in the residential school system, as the reasons for his dependency.