Yesterday a U.S. district judge ruled that Native Americans can
collectively sue the federal government for mishandling trust fund
monies (mis)managed by the BIA. Independent auditors indicated that the
BIA can't account for $2.4 billion. Named as defendants are Treasury
Secretary Robert Rubin, Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt and Assistant
Secretary for Indian Affairs Ada Deer.
According to the article, any Indian owed money by the government for
past land and natural-resource claims is now automatically part of a
lawsuit filed with the federal court in Washington DC. The suit already
includes about 300,000 people and the judge has ruled that the
descendants of Indians who had claims also can join the lawsuit.
In a report to Congress the Interior Department proposed several options
to settle the claims and avoid further lawsuits. One plan is to
distribute $300 million to tribes and put $300,000 more in a federal
development bank to help Indians develop their own businesses. However
this amounts to only about 8% of the missing funds.
Les Tate