Proposed Congressional Language Seeks to Eliminate the United Keetoowah Band’s Sovereignty and Land Rights

UKB Demands Immediate Removal of Termination Draft Proposed by CNO Senator

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Tahlequah, Okla. – The United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians (UKB) demands immediate retraction of a shocking and shameful legislative provision drafted by Senator Markwayne Mullin at the behest of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma that would terminate the UKB’s right to trust land and basic economic development rights within the reservation that it shares with the CNO in Northeastern Oklahoma.

Drafted in secret and without any input from the UKB, the language represents a full-scale assault on the sovereignty, identity, and legal status of the UKB – one of three federally recognized Cherokee tribes and a legal successor in interest to the extinct historic Cherokee Nation. The UKB only has the secret language because it made a request under the Freedom of Information Act, otherwise it would not have seen it.

“This is not a policy disagreement. This is a deliberate, targeted act of tribal termination by CNO Senator Mullin,” said UKB Chief Jeff Wacoche. “The draft language is a blatant betrayal of the U.S. government's trust responsibility, a violation of federal law, and an attack on tribal sovereignty.”

The secret draft language attempts to redefine who is – and who is not – Cherokee under federal law, elevating one tribe’s political and economic interests at the expense of another’s very existence. It would gut the UKB’s standing and attempt to render invisible a people who have already survived centuries of forced removal, disenfranchisement, and systemic oppression.

“This is genocide by redline,” Wacoche said. “And it is being carried out not with muskets or manifest destiny, but with a secret pen in a Senate office.” Ironically, the efforts of Senator Mullin are on behalf of the CNO, a very close supporter of former Presidents Biden and Obama.

The UKB’s federal rights are not theoretical. They are rooted in the treaties of the United States, enshrined in federal statute, and reaffirmed repeatedly by the Department of the Interior, the courts, and the U.S. Congress. The UKB is not subordinate to any other tribe. It is a sovereign government with a constitution, a functioning court system, elected leadership, and 15,000 Tribal Members, most of whom live in Northeastern Oklahoma.

“We are a federally recognized Tribe with our own government-to-government relationship with the United States,” Wacoche added. “To suggest otherwise is to willfully ignore history, federal law, and the truth.”

The UKB is calling on members of Congress, tribal nations across Indian Country, and all Americans all who believe in the principles of tribal sovereignty to take immediate action and contact the CNO and Senator Mullin and demand this language be immediately withdrawn from consideration in any upcoming appropriations bill and that they stop shamefully attempting to erase a sovereign Native nation and its people, and that they get back to work for Indian Country, including defending the legal treaty rights of the UKB.

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