{"id":804,"date":"2025-08-05T22:57:27","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T22:57:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/?p=804"},"modified":"2025-09-22T12:10:16","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T12:10:16","slug":"us-senator-mullin-accused-of-tribal-termination-over-ukb-land-gaming-ban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/05\/us-senator-mullin-accused-of-tribal-termination-over-ukb-land-gaming-ban\/","title":{"rendered":"US Senator Mullin Accused of \u2018Tribal Termination\u2019 Over UKB Land, Gaming Ban"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li><strong>Senator\u2019s draft bill could limit UKB land and gaming.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Tribe claims provision is an attack on sovereign rights.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>UKB signed gaming compact now awaiting federal approval.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<p>Oklahoma\u2019s United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians (UKB) is demanding the immediate withdrawal of a draft Senate provision that would bar it from acquiring new trust land or establishing gaming operations within the Cherokee Nation Reservation.<\/p>\n<p>The UKB calls the move \u201ca targeted act of tribal termination.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_359252\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-359252\" data-style=\"width: 858px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-post-thumbnail-858xAUTO wp-image-359252 lazyload\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" alt=\"United Keetoowah Band, UKB, Cherokee Nation, Senator Markwayne Mullin\" width=\"858\" height=\"513\" data-src=\"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Mullin-858x513-1.jpg\"><figcaption>US Senator Markwayne Mullins, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation and member of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, has drafted an amendment that the UKB says would strip it of its sovereign rights. (Image: U.S. Senate\/Public Domain)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Obtained only through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, the proposed amendment was reportedly drafted by US Senator Markwayne Mullin (R-2nd Dist.), a citizen of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/cherokee-nation-continues-to-await-arkansas-casino-ruling\/\">Cherokee Nation<\/a> and member of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs. It could be inserted into an upcoming federal appropriations bill.<\/p>\n<div class=\"callout\">\n<p>The draft provision reads, in part: \u201cNo funds appropriated under this or any other Act shall be used to take land into trust within the boundaries of the Cherokee Nation Reservation in Oklahoma without the written consent of the Cherokee Nation.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>It adds that \u201cno other Indian tribe than the Cherokee Nation shall possess tribal jurisdiction over such Reservation,\u201d and that any existing trust land acquired by another tribe \u201cshall be for non-gaming purposes only.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Longstanding Spat<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The UKB shares overlapping territory with the Cherokee Nation but remains a distinct sovereign government with around 15,000 enrolled citizens, most of whom reside in northeastern Oklahoma.<\/p>\n<p>Both tribes trace their lineage to the historic Cherokee people and are headquartered in Tahlequah but have clashed over territorial sovereignty. The Cherokee Nation has long argued it holds exclusive jurisdiction over Cherokee lands in the state.<\/p>\n<div class=\"callout\">\n<p>The Nation operates ten casinos in Oklahoma, while the UKB has none. The class II bingo hall it opened in 1986 was shut down in 2013 following a lawsuit by the Nation and pressure from state and federal regulators.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>At issue was the UKB\u2019s lack of\u00a0federally designated trust land, a legal requirement for tribal gaming under the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA).<\/p>\n<p>That has now changed. In 2019, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the US Interior Department\u2019s (DOI) decision to take a 76-acre parcel of land into trust for the tribe after the Nation sued to block the move.<\/p>\n<p>In April this year, the UKB <a href=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ukb-signs-oklahoma-gaming-compact-eyes-return-to-tribal-casino-market\/\">signed a gaming compact<\/a> with the state of Oklahoma, which is now pending final approval from the DOI<\/p>\n<h2><strong>\u2018Secret Pen in a Senate Office\u2019<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>\u201cThis is not a policy disagreement. This is a deliberate, targeted act of tribal termination by \u2026 Senator Mullin,\u201d UKB Chief Jeff Wacoche told <em>Casino.org <\/em>of Mullin\u2019s draft amendment<em>. \u201c<\/em>The \u2026 language is a blatant betrayal of the US government&#8217;s trust responsibility, a violation of federal law, and an attack on tribal sovereignty.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Wacoche went further, calling the language \u201cgenocide by redline.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"callout\">\n<p>\u201cIt is being carried out not with muskets or manifest destiny, but with a secret pen in a Senate office,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The tribe is now urging members of Congress, other tribal nations, and the public to pressure Mullin and the Cherokee Nation to scrap the proposed amendment.<\/p>\n<div class=\"callout\">\n<blockquote class=\"main-blockquote\">\n<p>We are a federally recognized Tribe with our own government-to-government relationship with the United States,\u201d Wacoche said. \u201cTo suggest otherwise is to willfully ignore history, federal law, and the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<p><em>Casino.org<\/em> has reached out to Mullin\u2019s office for comment but had not heard back as of press time.<\/p>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/us-senator-mullin-accused-of-tribal-termination-over-ukb-land-gaming-ban\/\">US Senator Mullin Accused of \u2018Tribal Termination&#8217; Over UKB Land, Gaming Ban<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\">Casino.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Senator\u2019s draft bill could limit UKB land and gaming. Tribe claims provision is an attack on sovereign rights. UKB signed gaming compact now awaiting federal approval. Oklahoma\u2019s United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians (UKB) is demanding the immediate withdrawal of a draft Senate provision that would bar it from acquiring new trust land or establishing gaming operations within the Cherokee [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":806,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=804"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":807,"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804\/revisions\/807"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.chuckwardrealestate.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}