Tribe sidesteps disenrollment as a human and civil rights issue

Nooksack leadership claims tribal disenrollees won’t lose their culture as a result of being disenrolled and evicted.

Lawyer Gabe Galanda, with George Adams and Nooksack 306 family members, in 2015. The American Bar Association Commission on Racial and Ethnic Diversity in the Profession named Galanda a 2022 recipient of its Spirit of Excellence Award. (courtesy Galanda Broadman law firm)

WASHINGTON — Will the U.S. Departments of the Interior, State, and Housing and Urban Development (HUD) give credence to the Nooksack Indian Tribe’s effort to center its controversial disenrollment of 306 tribal citizens as an issue solely about the extent of tribal sovereignty? 

Or will the U.S. government look to past on-the-book federal law and policy that implies these are issues of federal interest that relate at least partially to Indigenous human and civil rights issues? 

These are the weighty policy questions that Indigenous advocates are asking of leaders like Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs Bryan Newland, as well as of Marcia Fudge, the secretary of HUD.