{"id":2190,"date":"2020-10-06T13:36:53","date_gmt":"2020-10-06T18:36:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.indianz.com\/News\/?p=2190"},"modified":"2020-10-06T13:40:09","modified_gmt":"2020-10-06T18:40:09","slug":"gabe-galanda-the-forgotten-plight-of-the-disenrolled-in-indian-country","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/2020\/10\/06\/gabe-galanda-the-forgotten-plight-of-the-disenrolled-in-indian-country\/","title":{"rendered":"Gabe Galanda: The forgotten plight of the disenrolled in Indian Country"},"content":{"rendered":" <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" data-attachment-id=\"2193\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/2020\/10\/06\/gabe-galanda-the-forgotten-plight-of-the-disenrolled-in-indian-country\/mmiw-2\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/mmiw-scaled.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"2560,1707\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;2.8&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;ILCE-7M3&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;1578794444&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;76&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;6400&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0.00625&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"mmiw\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/mmiw-1024x683.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/mmiw-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"mmiw\"   class=\"alignnone img-fluid wp-image-2193\" \/>\r\n<figcaption class=\"figure-caption\">  Red cutouts symbolizing missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls are seen at a vigil in honor of Ashlea Aldrich, a citizen of the Omaha Tribe who was murdered in Nebraska in January 2020. Photo by <A href=\"\/m.asp?url=https:\/\/twitter.com\/Kevin_Abourezk\">Kevin Abourezk <I aria-hidden=true class=\"fab  fa-twitter\"><\/I><\/A> \r\n<\/figcaption>\r\n<div class=\"h3-responsive font-weight-bold\">Disenrollment and the Missing and Murdered<\/div>\r\n<div class=\"date\">Tuesday, October 6, 2020<\/div>\r\n<div class=\"byline\">By Gabriel S. Galanda<\/div>\r\n<div class=\"source-links\"><a href=https:\/\/www.galandabroadman.com\/>galandabroadman.com<\/a><\/div>\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nAs our women, men, and children go missing and get murdered, we say their names.  We cry for outside help.  We yearn for their return.  We mourn their passing.  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nBut there are other relatives who go missing or suffer violence and we do not mention them. We sit quiet. We ignore their plight.  We forget them.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nThose forgotten relatives who have gone missing are the Disenrolled.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nWe also ignore the violence and murder that accompanies tribal disenrollment.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nA new book, <a href=https:\/\/amzn.to\/34zffaF><EM>Mass Murder In California\u2019s Empty Quarter<\/em><\/a>, chronicles the intersection of murder and disenrollment.  <a href=https:\/\/www.nebraskapress.unl.edu\/bison-books\/9781496217561\/>Author Ray March tells the story<\/a> of how, in 2014, a former Cedarville Rancheria Chairwoman executed her brother, nephew, niece, and the tribe\u2019s administrator before they could evict her, deprive her of $80,000 in annual gaming per capita monies, and disenroll her.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\n<div class=row><div class=col-md-7>\r\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"600\" height=\"837\" data-attachment-id=\"2194\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/2020\/10\/06\/gabe-galanda-the-forgotten-plight-of-the-disenrolled-in-indian-country\/massmurderincaliforniasemptyquarter\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/massmurderincaliforniasemptyquarter.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"600,837\" data-comments-opened=\"0\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;1&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"massmurderincaliforniasemptyquarter\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/massmurderincaliforniasemptyquarter.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/massmurderincaliforniasemptyquarter.jpg\" alt=\"massmurderincaliforniasemptyquarter\"  class=\"alignnone img-fluid wp-image-2194\" \/><\/div>\r\n<div class=\"col-md-5 align-self-end\"><figcaption class=\"figure-caption\"><a href=https:\/\/amzn.to\/34zffaF><EM>Mass Murder In California\u2019s Empty Quarter<\/em><\/a> by Ray March. <a href=https:\/\/www.nebraskapress.unl.edu\/bison-books\/9781496217561\/>University of Nebraska Press, 2020<\/a>.\r\n<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nAt the time of that mass murder in Alturas, California, as the book explains, the disenrollment epidemic was rampant on the West Coast.  And as a consequence, disenrollment-related violence was also on the rise nationwide, particularly in California.\r\n <p><\/p>\r\nIn 1996, intra-tribal violence erupted within the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community when a minority tribal faction seized a tribal building and repeatedly clashed with \u201ctribal police\u201d for eighteen months in response to a tribal council\u2019s \u201cknocking 200 political foes off the voting rolls.\u201d \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nIn 2000, Las Vegas Paiute Tribal police chief and her husband were arrested for an alleged assault on a tribal-council member in a dispute resulting from disenrollment proceedings. \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nIn 2012, the disenrollment dispute on the Picayune Rancheria resulted in a standoff between two factions that ended in a riot, resulting in injuries including stabbings. \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nIn 2013, there was an eleven-hour standoff between the Butte County Sheriff\u2019s Department and peaceful protesters at the Berry Creek Rancheria headquarters. The protest was an attempt to stop the permanent disenrollment of more than 70 Tyme Maidu members. Protesters surrendered and were arrested after the Sheriff\u2019s deputies resorted to flash-bang grenades. \r\n <p><\/p>\r\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Ex-leader of Cedarville Rancheria faces death sentence for murders <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/California?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#California<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/H7UKXCHTZ1\">https:\/\/t.co\/H7UKXCHTZ1<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/TNXiZhFvdY\">pic.twitter.com\/TNXiZhFvdY<\/a><\/p>&mdash; indianz.com (@indianz) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/indianz\/status\/819245327375073281?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">January 11, 2017<\/a><\/blockquote> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\r\n<P><\/P>\r\nWithin a week of the Cedarville tragedy, a thirteen-year <a href=https:\/\/www.bia.gov\/>Bureau of Indian Affairs<\/a> (BIA) Pacific Region employee sounded the alarm to the Director of the BIA\u2019s Office of Justice Services (OJS) in Washington, D.C., warning that disenrollment-related \u201cattacks at tribal offices may now begin to increase similar to the increase in school shootings in the aftermath of Columbine.\u201d  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nOJS was warned: \u201cIn the Pacific Region and elsewhere there have been many tribal disenrollments as competing groups and families exert their power.  Groups of . . . Indians are reportedly now having heated discussions through social media.\u201d\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nThe BIA employee was correct.  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nBy 2014, disenrollment in communities like the Nooksack, Grand Ronde, and Saginaw Chippewa Reservations and Pala and Paskenta Rancherias had gotten heated.  Fueled by charged Facebook rhetoric, in particular, each community was a powder keg waiting to explode.  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nThat year at Paskenta, a Tribal Council faction disenrolled 80 people, seized the tribe\u2019s casino, and deputized a non-Indian militia\u2014equipping them with AR-15s to secure the gaming palace and its coffers.  Having seen the semiautomatic rifle-toting goons at Paskenta with my own eyes, I remain surprised and relieved that nobody was maimed or killed. \r\n<p><\/p> <div class=\"mt-1 mb-1\"><ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display:block; text-align:center;\" data-ad-layout=\"in-article\" data-ad-format=\"fluid\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-8411603009680747\" data-ad-slot=\"6394965691\"><\/ins><script>(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});<\/script><\/div> <p><\/p>\r\nTwo years later things turned violent at Nooksack, where tribal cops commenced their practice of brutalizing and harassing Indigenous women and elders who oppose the disenrollment of the Nooksack 306. I have also personally witnessed nearly a decade of tribally sanctioned intimidation and violence at Nooksack and credit the 306 for not physically fighting back.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nIndian Country is lucky that there has not been another mass casualty event like Cedarville.  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nWhen an Indigenous person\u2019s \u201ceverything\u201d is being forcibly taken away; when a disenrollee is faced with losing their home, land, job, healthcare, relations, and identity, it is fathomable that they will fight back in order to survive and protect their family.  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nWhen there is no legal or political recourse whatsoever because \u2014\u201cit\u2019s an internal matter\u201d\u2014to paraphrase U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall in <a href=https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Santa_Clara_Pueblo_v._Martinez><em>Santa Clara Pueblo v. Martinez<\/em><\/a>\u2014it is fathomable that disenrollees might take matters into their own hands.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nWhen an Indigenous person\u2019s cultural and socioeconomic safety net is cut out from under them, it is fathomable that they might feel the need to get before getting got. \r\n<p><\/p>\r\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">&quot;No Rest in Redding&quot; by <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/natasha_marie_b?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@natasha_marie_b<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/OrviN7uURI\">https:\/\/t.co\/OrviN7uURI<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/StopDisenrollment?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#StopDisenrollment<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/pLamVxfE5O\">pic.twitter.com\/pLamVxfE5O<\/a><\/p>&mdash; Gabe Galanda, Indigenous Rights Lawyer (@NDNlawyer) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/NDNlawyer\/status\/1310682163751186432?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 28, 2020<\/a><\/blockquote> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\r\n<P><\/P>\r\nViolence and murder are never acceptable, but such outcomes are predictable.  Having represented over 1,000 disenrollees from throughout the country and witnessed their persecution over the last decade, I constantly fear the worst.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nNot even <a href=\/covid19\/>COVID-19<\/a> has stopped disenrollment or assuaged my fear.  Tribes like the Habemotel Pomo of Upper Lake cruelly purged tribal members notwithstanding the pandemic. The stresses and trauma of COVID-19 added to disenrollment are accelerants of an already deadly arson fire.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\nRay March reports that after Cedarville, the BIA developed an \u201caction report\u201d to guard against any copycat, disenrollment-related murder or attack. That weak response not nearly enough, especially because it is the United States that has catalyzed disenrollment and related violence. \r\n<p><\/p> \r\nAccording to research I\u2019ve done while sheltering in place, for the last 230 consecutive years the federal government created devices that have divided and diminished Indigenous peoples. These include Indian \u201cpayrolls\u201d by 1790, blood quantum by 1817, censuses and \u201cper capita\u201d payments by the mid-1800s, enrollment by the late 1800s, disenrollment by the early 1900s, constitutional governance by 1934, and unregulated gaming distributions by 1988.  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nBy the 21st Century, these devices have been turned into weapons within 15% of tribal nations  and wielded by tribal members to terminate their own kin.  There are 10,000 disenrollment casualties, and counting.  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nThere are also literal casualties, as at Cedarville.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">&quot;Next stop for our bills to keep Indigenous people from disappearing is the President\u2019s desk&quot;: Legislation to address the crisis of missing and murdered loved ones, especially women and girls, is almost law. <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RepDebHaaland?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@RepDebHaaland<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/SavannasAct?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#SavannasAct<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NotInvisible?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#NotInvisible<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/MMIW?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#MMIW<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/8XBrvnFfME\">https:\/\/t.co\/8XBrvnFfME<\/a><\/p>&mdash; indianz.com (@indianz) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/indianz\/status\/1311445020717862912?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 30, 2020<\/a><\/blockquote> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\r\n<P><\/P>\r\nDespite these truths, both the Obama and Trump administrations have ignored cries for federal police protection against disenrollment-related violence. A BIA-OTJ bureaucratic plan doesn\u2019t come close to cutting it.  Likewise, Congress and national tribal organizations turn a deaf ear to Indigenous cries for help and protection. \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nDespite all of the rhetoric on Capitol Hill about enhancing tribal law and order, deterring violence against our women, and bringing our missing and murdered relatives home, nobody expresses a word of concern about the Indigenous dehumanization associated with disenrollment.  \r\n<p><\/p>\r\nDespite today\u2019s historic human rights reckoning, nobody in federal-tribal political circles expresses a genuine word about Indigenous human rights protection.  For as long as silence is our status quo, it is only a question of time before the next violent episode\u2014dare I say the next mass murder\u2014befalls us.  Only then might we ask ourselves if Indigenous lives really matter.\r\n<p><\/p>\r\n<HR><EM>Gabriel S. Galanda is the Managing Lawyer at <a href=https:\/\/www.galandabroadman.com\/>Galanda Broadman<\/a>, PLLC, an Indigenous rights law firm.  He belongs to the Round Valley Indian Tribes, descending from the Nomlaki and Concow Peoples.<\/em><HR>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Despite all of the rhetoric on Capitol Hill about enhancing tribal law and order, deterring violence against our women, and bringing our missing and murdered relatives home, nobody expresses concern about the dehumanization associated with disenrollment.","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2193,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_vp_format_video_url":"","_vp_image_focal_point":[],"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,13,9,14],"tags":[117,530,516,111,38,518,101,515,514,528,529,522,520,511,523,197,521,526,527,525,517,519,524,220,84,314],"class_list":["post-2190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-indian-trust","category-law","category-opinion","category-politics","tag-bia","tag-blood-quantum","tag-boks","tag-books","tag-california","tag-cedarville","tag-crime","tag-disenrollment","tag-gabe-galanda","tag-grand-ronde","tag-habemotel-pomo","tag-kbic","tag-las-vegas-paiute","tag-law-enforcement","tag-michigan","tag-mmiw","tag-nevada","tag-nooksack","tag-pala","tag-paskenta","tag-per-caps","tag-ray-march","tag-sagchips","tag-sovereignty","tag-supreme-court","tag-washington","no-wpautop"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/mmiw-scaled.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcoJ7g-zk","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2190"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2190\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}