Trust deal 'a joke,' state Indians tell U.S. senators

By Judy Gibbs Robinson,
Published: September 2, 2006

TULSA - Staff members for a U.S. Senate committee got an earful Friday when they came to Oklahoma to find out what Indians think of a proposed trust case settlement.

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Indian trust case
Background: For decades, many individual American Indians have owned their property "in trust." The federal government, acting as trustee, leased some property rights to others and collected money from such leases on behalf of the Indian owners. A lawsuit filed in 1996 accused the government of failing to turn over all that money. The government has been unable to produce an adequate accounting of where the money went.

New development: The Bush administration signaled in early August it wants to settle the case. The Senate Indian Affairs Committee, already considering settlement legislation, sent staff members to meet with Indians across the country to discuss it.

What's next: Committee staff will consider comments collected at the meetings and possibly propose revisions to the bill.

Source: Friends Committee on National Legislation

"I think it's a joke," said Talee Redcorn, a member of the Osage Nation's minerals council.

"I think this government does not want to live up to what they've done," said Marcianna R. Jacobs, a member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes.

The hearing was to give Oklahoma Indians a chance to weigh in on proposed legislation to settle a decade-old class-action lawsuit called the Cobell case, which accuses the government of mismanaging Indian trust accounts.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs have said Indians may be owed as much as $27.5 billion. The Senate bill proposes settling for $8 billion.

"The $27.5 billion should really be revisited because that's ridiculous to go from $27.5 to $8 billion," said E. Bernadette Huber, chairman of the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma.

"If we Indians owed the U.S. government $27 billion they would want every penny of it," said Emily Saupitty, an Apache from Apache.

But David Mullon, the committee's general counsel, said $8 billion is the figure his boss, U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., thinks he can get through Congress.

"Every account holder, of course, would like it to be more," Mullon said. "We're not going to get $27.5 billion through the 109th Congress. It ain't going to happen."

About 60 people attended the meeting, the last of four held around Indian Country during Congress' August recess. Previous meetings were in Auburn, Wash.; Phoenix; and Bismarck, N.D.

Oklahoma speakers were uniformly critical of the settlement's price tag and the lack of an "opt-out clause" that would let individual Indians pursue separate lawsuits.

"A lot of people feel they are owed more," Quapaw Chief John Berrey said.

"We'd appreciate it if you could ponder a little harder about some further due process," he said.

Keith Harper, a lawyer representing lead plaintiff Eloise Cobell, a Blackfeet Indian from Montana, said his client considers the lack of an opt-out clause a "poison pill" that could kill the deal.

"In this day and age, this ought to be a consensual thing. It shouldn't be a forced-down thing," Harper said.

Mullon said an opt-out clause is not an option because one of the government's goals in settling is to be finished with the trust issue once and for all.

"If you want a settlement in the billions, then ending all claims is a part of it. They want total peace. They want an end to the litigation," he said.

Osage Nation Principal Chief Jim Gray, chairman of the Intertribal Monitoring Association on Indian Trust Funds, said the legislation probably has a 50-50 chance of passing.

"There's a genuine desire on both sides to settle, but there's a lot of debate on whose terms," Gray said.