Posted on 11/19/2024 3:54:39 PM PST by CondoleezzaProtege
Indian Country, just like the rest of America, has a choice to make in this election.
One party wants to roll back excess regulation, shrink the administrative state, and promote personal agency and individual responsibility; the other side wants big government to dictate nearly every aspect of American life — from the car you can drive to how you can use your own land.
In my view, as a member of the Cherokee Nation, our Native values of tribal sovereignty and self-determination are best aligned with President Donald J. Trump and the Republican Party.
I have spent my entire life in Indian Country. My wife and I are proud to be raising our six wonderful children here. In total, 39 federally-recognized tribes call Oklahoma home. As a kid, I used Indian Health Services without realizing there was anything unique about it. Growing up in Oklahoma, I didn’t know there was anything different, or “special,” about being Native until I got to Congress.
Shortly after being sworn in, my friend, Congressman Tom Cole, a Republican in Oklahoma and an enrolled member of the Chickasaw Nation, told me that we had just doubled the size of the Congressional Native American Caucus — to two. Years later, I now find myself one-of-one in the U.S. Senate.
To say there has been a historic disconnect between Indian Country and Washington, D.C., would be the understatement of the century. Indian Country only represents about four percent of the voting population — and within that, only about 40 percent of eligible tribal voters participate in general elections. For years, Native communities have been forgotten by both political parties. That is, until Donald Trump entered office.
Donald Trump understands the importance of recognizing tribes as sovereign with an inherent right to self-governance and self-determination. As president, he governed with that commitment in mind.
On January 29, 2018, President Trump signed a Republican-led bill to federally recognize more tribes than any other president in modern history: the Chickahominy, Eastern Chickahominy, Upper Mattaponi, Rappahannock, Monacan, and the Nansemond.
President Trump signed the CARES Act, which authorized $8 billion to address coronavirus preparedness, response, and recovery for Indian Country. The initial allocation was among the boldest investments in American history for Indian Country.
In 2019, President Trump and the President of Finland finalized an agreement to repatriate tribal ancestral remains culturally connected to the Mesa Verde region. The negotiation concluded with a September 2020 ceremony in the Oval Office – a strong demonstration of respect for Native culture, and the federal responsibility under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. But he didn’t stop there.
President Trump’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act created Opportunity Zones to spur economic development in tribal communities across the nation. Since then, investment tax incentives have been available and used by investors and businesses, located in or around tribal lands, across the United States.
For too long, energy companies have routinely “moved on” from proposed projects because the Bureau of Indian Affairs (among other agencies) wastes time on permitting approvals for reservation and trust lands. In 2017, President Trump signed desperately needed legislation to amend the Indian Tribal Energy Development and Self-Determination Act — granting tribes greater autonomy over the management and development of their own energy resources.
In 2018, President Trump signed a Farm Bill that contained the most dynamic expansion of self-governance authority in decades. The expansion of 638 contracting and compacting authority for tribes to administer their own USDA feeding programs was a historic moment. It was a crystal-clear demonstration — through action — of the Republican commitment to local autonomy, self-determination, and tribal sovereignty.
That year, President Trump also created the Department of Interior’s Joint Opioid Reduction Task Force to dismantle and disrupt opioid and heroin distribution networks in Indian Country. The Task Force made more than 840 arrests and seized more than three tons of illegal narcotics with an estimated street value of more than $32 million.
In November 2019, President Trump signed an Executive Order establishing the Operation Lady Justice Task Force, a multi-agency effort to enhance the operation of the criminal justice system, and address the staggering number of missing and murdered American Indian and Alaska Natives in tribal communities. At every turn, President Trump led from the front on issues essential to Indian Country.
With early voting already underway, and Election Day quickly approaching, Indian Country has the potential to make a tremendous difference in this race — especially in competitive swing states. Donald Trump has a proven record of fighting for tribal self-determination and sovereignty. In a second term, Indian Country can count on Donald Trump to deliver once again.
The vast majority of tribal communities agree upon one fundamentally conservative principle: the freedom to conduct business on their lands, as they see fit, outside of federal government interference. There is one choice for President of the United States who has and will continue to govern by that freedom. I encourage all tribal citizens who are eligible to vote to exercise their civic duty as soon as possible — the future of Indian Country is at stake.
There are a lot of people who claim to be Christian who aren’t. All talk but no love of God in their hearts. That said, I have never run onto anyone who has a thing against American Indians except the occasional internet troll. Could be because I am from the Midwest and live in the South. Conditions probably differ out west or way up north where there are reservations, where government policy- Gov culture- has torn up families and communities as it has in urban blue cities, causing friction with everyone else.
Jesus isn’t a bigot. Race isn’t an issue with Him. He was rejected by his own people and yet cared for aliens, outcasts and the unpopular, even the hated, even the lepers whom everyone avoided. He taught us to pray the Lord’s prayer, and it is pretty clear that our sins are forgiven as we forgive others’ sins against us... that leaves no room for people who hate or hold grudges, whether or not they believe they have reasons for doing it.
If you hear so called Christians hating you just for being American Indian, call them out on where they are wrong using what you study in the Bible to expose them.
About time they started thinking for themselves and getting off the mental reservation.
Thank you for the objective discussion.
“If you hear so called Christians hating you just for being American Indian, call them out on where they are wrong using what you study in the Bible to expose them.”
Oh trust me... There have been many times over the years here. They stereotype all as heathen, unbelieving, savages who still practice human sacrifice.
Do a search in the archives for anything related such as returning ANY land back to the natives. The fangs and claws of greed, hatred, and intolerance come out.
An no they are not trolls, they are devout regulars in the Religion forum who have been here for many years. It is an example of radical extremism that rivals Islam.
I don’t participate there because they would stone me to death or burn me at the stake as a heathen. But they have no problem coming over to other forums and destroying constructive discussion in that direction.
“making Oaklahoma a State was the biggest betrayal. From the time of Jackson, it wad set aside as Indian Land.”
But worse my fiend, was transporting us all there from our homelands in the first place. We were living together just fine when that happened. We had already been “civilized” and living as Christians. In fact because of the times, many natives were fellow slave owners and had plantations. But they wanted those plantations too... Never enough... Always more.
I will defend my hero here, although you proably dislike him. Part of the Jackson plan to send the Cherokies West, was because the would have been slaughtered in Geogia. THAT is why the Oaklahoma betrayal was so previous. It was set aside to be a safe haven
Grevious
Nice thought and excuse but that is not why. They needed us out of the way...
The picture of Jackson will be going up in the Oval Office,cas Jackson is Trump’s Political hero.
And our neighboring reservation voted for Harris, so did one in the southern part of the state. Oddly two others went for Trump.
Plenty of Christians gave their lives fighting false prophets. Rather ironic screen name you have.
“Crimes committed in the name of Christianity were not committed in the name of Christ but in man’s name.”
I completely agree with you. There is nothing wrong with the faith at all, it is a moral faith. The problem is how that faith is practiced by man. They do not honestly practice the very morals the faith mandates.
The tribes of Oklahoma still vote REPUBLICAN because they remember it was Andrew Jackson, who founded the Democratic Party, and forced them to Oklahoma on the Trail of Tears.
Meanwhile, outside Oklahoma, in the West, many of the tribes still vote for their Democrat Masters.
***Quakers tolerant of the natives*** Sometimes they go too far. During the French and Indian War(1764) with the British, the pro-French tribes were attacking settlers all through Pennsylvania. The Quaker government refused to call out the militias to protect them.
So the citizens took their dead and piled them in the hall to the legislature, forcing the Quaker legislature to walk over them. They finally did call out the militias.
These same tribes were responsible for the first school house massacre in the Colonies, the Enoch Brown school massacre.
So glad we do not live in those times anymore.
“So glad we do not live in those times anymore.”
And that is my point right there. We are not scalping anyone anymore. So stop treating us as if we do.
Yes, Indian Land until the tribes joined the Confederacy in the Civil War. Stand Watie( Cherokee) was the last Confederate General to cease fighting. As a result a new treaty was hammered out(in 1866) in which the Pro-South tribes lost the Western half of the state.
Other tribes were then brought in to settle the Western half of the state.
The Cheyenne-Arapaho was given a large reservation East and North of the Cimmaron River, West of the Arkansas river, and South of the Kansas line. They did not get the Washita area till years later.
So instead of going there they joined the other tribes at the Washita and began to make raids into Kansas. General Sheridan ordered Custer to find and punish those tribes. His Osage Scouts followed the trail back through the snow to Black Kettle’s camp where they were having a big Scalp Dance and you can bet it was not Kaw or Pawnee scalps they were dancing over. Custer hit them the next morning. In the fight, the women and children fled right into the waiting arms of the Osages who began to kill them. The National Park service agrees with this.
https://www.nps.gov/waba/learn/historyculture/osage-scouts.htm
“We were living together just fine when that happened.”
Not really. How the tribes treated each other before the White Man arrived.
https://archive.news.wsu.edu/press-release/2014/08/04/wsu-researchers-see-violent-era-in-ancient-southwest/#.U9_iumNjYzJ
Last days of the ancient Pueblos.
https://blairmastbaum.substack.com/p/the-terrifying-final-days-of-the
Crow Creek Massacre.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/feb/9/crow-creek-massacre-in-1300s-remains-south-dakotas/
https://www.academia.edu/7907221/Mass_Grave_at_Crow_Creek_in_South_Dakota_Reveals_How_Indians_Massacred_Indians_in_14th_Century_Attack
Sacred Ridge Massacre.
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/massacre-sacred-ridge
Human sacrifice at Cahokia
https://www.ancientpages.com/2015/08/27/human-sacrifice-at-cahokia-victims-were-locals-not-foreign-captives/
Ancient Massacre Discovered in New Mexico — Was It Genocide?
https://lostworlds.org/ancient-massacre-discovered-in-new-mexico-was-it-genocide/
Anasazi Cannibalism
https://archive.archaeology.org/9709/newsbriefs/anasazi.html
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-antiquity/article/abs/additional-evidence-for-cannibalism-in-the-southwest-the-case-of-la-4528/FB7F8B0434EA3118B716AE84EC368DC8
Basketmaker II Cave 7: Massacre or Cemetery?
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0305440312000829
Massacre at Awatovi is little known act of genocide
https://www.santafenewmexican.com/news/trail_dust/trail-dust-hopi-massacre-at-awatovi-is-little-known-act-of-genocide/image_830b57c1-78ad-5775-8b72-ed47dd6aba23.html
How genocide wiped out a Native American population
https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna39268873
New Research Supports Theory of Ancient Massacre Site in Utah
https://www.cityweekly.net/BuzzBlog/archives/2013/09/11/new-research-supports-theory-of-ancient-massacre-site-in-utah
And who can forget the Cherokee Slave Rebellion of 1842.
https://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry?entry=SL002
And not a white man around to blame it on for centuries.
I go to a small church 200 yards outside the Cherokee lands. Many of our congregation are Cherokee and we get along well. Lots of real churches in the Cherokee lands welcoming everyone.
Our pastor gave up a high dollar salary with a major US corporation when he felt “the call” to preach to a small congregation of around 50 people.
Whites and Cherokees are so intermixed you can not tell them apart except by the tags on the cars. Many of the students I went to school with were Cherokee but did not look Cherokee.
Before living here I lived and went to school among the Navajos in NW New Mexico.
You took our discussion completely out of timeline and context. Purposely?
If you look we were discussing just before the trail of tears to Oklahoma. To make it other than that particular discussion is dishonest and deceptive.
I’m surprised you didn’t throw in the head hunters and South American sacrifices.
This is the exact bias and immorality I speak of designed to support the “heathen savage” propaganda. We are no longer in those days so you can stop trying to prove Indians are savages.
**I’m surprised you didn’t throw in the head hunters and South American sacrifices.***
That was a Spanish-Portuguese problem not related to the USA.
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