Mont. Senate candidates vie for American Indian vote with similar pieces of legislation

E&E News
By Dylan Brown
July 16, 2014

The candidates vying for Montana's up-for-grabs Senate seat have offered slightly different bills to address an important issue for American Indian tribes -- a voting bloc that could prove vital in the state this election cycle.

Separate measures from Democratic Sen. John Walsh and Republican Rep. Steve Daines aim to get the tribes more involved in the federal buyback program stemming from the landmark 2010 Cobell settlement. The bills are another indication Walsh and Daines are listening closely to a historically ignored constituency as November looms, with control of the Senate potentially riding on their race.

The buyback program is meant to offset more than a century of federal mismanagement of funds generated from tribal lands by consolidating "fractionated" tribal property. Such lands have been divided into small parcels, making them harder to develop for agriculture or other purposes. Under the program, individual tribal members are compensated for small landholdings and the tribes assume control over larger tracts.

But a year after the Department of the Interior began the program, Montana tribes have been at the forefront of those across the country criticizing the slow implementation of a limited-time process that tribal leaders say they don't have enough influence over (E&E Daily, April 4).

"I am outraged at the lack of urgency the federal government has shown our tribal nations, and it is time we fix this wrong that has been more than a century in the making," Walsh said after introducing S. 2387 in May.

Walsh's bill and Daines' H.R. 5020, introduced last week, require the Interior Department to enter into contracts directly with any tribe that requests a say over determining which land should be purchased. They also authorize depositing certain amounts of land into interest-bearing accounts, generating revenue for the tribe.

An eye toward November

Neither Walsh nor Daines has been in office long, but both quickly made a point of reaching out to Native Americans, Montana's second-largest ethnic group according to census data.

At 8 percent of Montana's population, Native Americans have long been a consistent Democratic voting bloc, but Daines has been working hard to turn the trend.

In just his second month in Congress last year, he made Crow Tribal Chairman Darrin Old Coyote his guest of honor at President Obama's State of the Union address. Since then, he has made frequent trips back to Montana's Indian Country.

A week after Walsh was tapped in February to replace six-term Sen. Max Baucus (D), now U.S. ambassador to China, he and fellow Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) visited six out of Montana's seven reservations. Walsh has been back repeatedly since, bookending last week with trips to a powwow on the Flathead Indian Reservation and another on the Blackfeet Reservation.

In Congress, Daines and Walsh have mirrored each other in support of related legislation. Both have backed bills to federally recognize the Little Shell Chippewa Tribe and introduced House and Senate versions of the "Northern Cheyenne Lands Act," seeking to expand mineral rights on the Northern Cheyenne reservation in southwestern Montana.

Walsh has actively supported the Crow Tribe's coal development by advocating for the Indian coal production tax credit in the Senate, while Daines broke ranks with House Republicans to vote for the Violence Against Women Act, which increased protections for tribal women.

Close ties to Cobell

Walsh's bill addressing the federal buyback program mirrors a House measure introduced by House Natural Resources ranking member Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) to amend the Claims Resolution Act, the direct result of the 2010 Cobell settlement. Daines' bill instead would amend the Indian Land Consolidation Act.

Alee Lockman, Daines' communications director, said the small difference was meant to give Congress greater ability to effect change through the underlying law because the terms of the settlement under the Claims Resolution Act can't be altered.

Walsh Deputy Chief of Staff Andrea Helling said the senator's bill was simply a direct response to the concerns of tribal members.

Montana remains intimately tied to the Cobell issue. The 500,000-member settlement took its name from Elouise Cobell, who lived in Browning on the Blackfeet Reservation in northwestern Montana. Five of Montana's seven tribes were among the 21 the Interior Department announced in May would be the focus of the buyback.

Fort Peck Assiniboine & Sioux Tribal Councilman Grant Stafne and Fort Belknap Tribal Council President Mark Azure both represented the concerns of tribal leaders nationwide by criticizing elements of the program at an April hearing of the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Indian and Alaska Native Affairs requested by Daines.

"The Land Buy Back Program has provided Indian Country with a means to improve their future," Daines said at the hearing. "However, as we have heard today, the program is not working and the hope in Indian Country is turning into frustration."

A court settlement last month requiring the installation of satellite voting stations on three isolated Montana reservations could boost turnout on the Northern Cheyenne, Crow and Fort Belknap reservations (E&E Daily, June 16).

With forecasters predicting a tight race, every vote will count for Daines as he looks to improve from his showing in the 2012 House race. Even though he won the statewide vote by 10 points, he lost by 22 points in the counties encompassing five reservations including the Crow and Fort Belknap.

Meanwhile, Lauren Passalacqua, a Walsh campaign spokeswoman, said the senator already has plans to establish a field office presence in Indian Country.