OKLAHOMA CITY — When Kamala Harris And Donald Trump While campaigning in North Carolina, both candidates had courted a state-recognized tribe there, whose 55,000 members could have helped tilt the swing state.
Trump promised in September that he would sign legislation to grant federal recognition to the Lumbee Tribe, a distinction that would unlock access to federal funds. Ultimately, he won North Carolina by more than 3 percentage points, thanks in part to continued support from Lumbee voters.
As Trump prepares to return to the White House in January, the promise will be tested. He has Republican allies in Congress on the issue, and now the Lumbee, as well as tribal nations across the country, are watching closely to see what comes next.
Tribal nations typically gain federal recognition through an application to the Department of the Interior, but the Lumbee have tried to circumvent that process for many years by going through Congress. Chairman John Lowery called Interior’s hiring process “flawed” and overly long and said it should be up to Congress to correct what he called a historic wrong.
“It’s just crazy that we’re here fighting this battle, and I have to tell you, I’m real in 2024,” Lowery said.
After the presidential election, the Lumbee hope momentum will build for their cause, but they face entrenched opposition from tribal nations across the country.
Several tribes, including the only one federally recognized in North Carolina, argue that if the Lumbee Tribe wants federal recognition, it must go through the formal process with the Department of the Interior. A person familiar with Trump’s thinking said the president-elect will demand exactly that from the Lumbee tribe, and that he will not sign a Lumbee recognition bill. The person requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about Trump’s views.
Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said “no policy should be considered official unless it comes directly from President Trump.”
Federal recognition is extremely important because it comes with access to resources such as healthcare through the Indian Health Service and the ability to create a land base such as reservations through the land-to-trust process. But before that happens, a tribal nation must submit a successful application to the Office of Federal Acknowledgment, a division within the Department of the Interior.
The Lumbee Tribe applied for federal recognition, but that petition was denied in 1985 because it “could not establish the group’s ancestry, cultural, political, or genealogical, from any tribe that historically existed in the area.”
In 2016, Interior reversed a decision that barred the Lumbee tribe from reapplying, but the Lumbee have opted for Congress’s route.
Gaining federal recognition through legislation is a rare but not unheard of path. But the Lumbee approach has ignited a simmering debate in both Indian Country and Congress about Native identity and tribal nationhood.
Members of Congress from both parties have supported recognition of the Lumbee through legislation, including Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma, a member of the Cherokee Nation who campaigned for Trump in North Carolina and supported the legislation.
But perhaps the state-recognized tribe’s most ardent ally in Congress is Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who is up for re-election in 2026.
Tillis introduced the Lumbee Fairness Act last year and was a vocal supporter of the Lumbee. In interviews with The Associated Press, several tribal leaders, lobbyists and advocates said Tillis had told them directly or through his staff that the senator is currently blocking certain bills supported by tribal nations and will continue to do so unless those tribes’ leaders support the reforms. Lumbee.
Among the bills he has pledged to block, according to those interviewed by the AP, is a land transfer that would allow the Tennessee Valley Authority to return 70 acres of land to the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, the only federally recognized tribal nation in the Tillis region. stands. It would allow the tribe to take the land in Monroe County, Tennessee into trust. The parcel is part of the tribal nation’s homelands and contains Sequoyah’s birthplace.
“It’s terrible for me. It’s a shame,” said Michell Hicks, chief of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. He said Tillis told him earlier this year that he would halt any legislation affecting the Eastern Band unless Hicks pledged his support.
Hicks is among the tribal leaders questioning the validity of the Lumbee’s historical claims, and he said there is none. About a century ago, the Lumbee were known as the Cherokee Indians of Robeson County, and for many years all three Cherokee tribes – the Eastern Band, the Cherokee Nation and the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians – have denounced this . and were outspoken opponents of granting federal recognition to the Lumbee.
Representatives for Tillis declined to comment.
Tillis blocked legislation last week that would have made this possible preserving the site of the Wounded Knee massacre. As he did so, he singled out the chiefs of the Oglala Sioux Tribe and the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, who have supported the conservation measure, for not supporting his efforts to federally recognize the Lumbee.
“This isn’t about you,” Tillis told the two tribes, whom he acknowledged had been trying to preserve the site of the massacre for a century. “But you should know that your leadership is playing a game that will ultimately force me to take a stand.”
Tillis suggested it was a “casino cartel,” driven in part by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and an Osage lawyer named Wilson Pipestem who works for the tribe, that is trying to prevent the Lumbee from gaining recognition, which could one day lead to the Lumbee. open their own casinos. Tillis threatened to continue publicly naming tribal leaders and their employees who he said were standing in the way of his bill.
In a statement to the AP, Pipestem said Tillis “must apologize to tribal leaders for his false accusations and unscrupulous tactics.”
Lowery acknowledged that Tillis blocked both bills, but he said Tillis did not do so at the direction of the Lumbee.
“If he has stopped the bill, it is because he has reached out to tribal leaders to see where they stand on his bill, and they apparently told him they do not support it,” Lowery said. “So he said, ‘If you can’t support my bill, I can’t support your bill.’”
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Graham Lee Brewer is an Oklahoma City-based member of AP’s Race and Ethnicity team.