WASHINGTON, DC – President Donald Trump’s chief of staff threatened to garnish federal coronavirus relief funding from a South Dakota Indian tribe if it didn’t remove roadblocks intended to limit the spread of the virus, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday.
The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe said the threat was one of several federal officials made after South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem asked Trump for help in getting rid of checkpoints that limit some drivers from passing through or stopping on the reservation in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The checkpoints are also used to inform travelers about COVID-19 policies on the reservations and collect information in case contact tracing is needed.
According to tribal leaders, tribal sovereignty and treaty rights allow them to set checkpoints up on reservation land and control who enters. Noem says the checkpoints on state and U.S. highways are illegal because there was a failure on the part of tribes to reach an agreement with the state.
The lawsuit says the checkpoints are legal because the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that tribes can exercise civil jurisdiction over nonmembers regarding conduct that threatens health and welfare. “The tribe’s Covid-19 response planning is essential to protect the tribal population, which suffers heightened vulnerability to the disease because of endemic poverty and health disparities,” the group said in the lawsuit. “The checkpoints have been effective, keeping the rate of infection “significantly” below that of South Dakota, and no one from the tribe has died from Covid-19 to date.”
Noem had previously threatened legal action against the Cheyenne River Sioux and the Oglala Sioux tribes over the checkpoints. No action was taken but Noem did send a letter to the president on May 20 seeking help in resolving the dispute. “The time has come for formal federal action,” Noem wrote, sending copies to the Department of Justice, the Bureau of Indian Affairs and South Dakota’s congressional members.
The complaint against President Trump, White House officials, and leadership in the Department of Interior and Bureau of Indian Affairs was filed Tuesday, June 23 at the federal court in Washington, D.C.
White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows “threatened the security” of the tribe’s coronavirus relief funding in a phone call with the tribe’s chairman on June 9, according to the lawsuit. White House and Bureau of Indian Affairs officials have also threatened to take over the tribe’s police department, according to the lawsuit. The tribe is asking for an order blocking the administration’s actions and declaring them unlawful. See lawsuit filing here
The Oglala Sioux and Cheyenne River Sioux tribes put the checkpoints in place in April and have resisted the governor’s orders to remove them.
