On December 4, 2023, the Department of the Interior announced the conclusion of the Land Buy-Back Program (“Program”) for Tribal Nations. The Program was established in December 2012 as a part of the Cobell v. Salazar Settlement Agreement, which provided a $1.9...
On December 12, 2023, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) finalized new regulations for taking fee lands into trust. The Fee-to-Trust regulations implement a provision in the 1934 Indian Reorganization Act (IRA) that allows the Secretary of the Interior to take lands...
On December 6th and 7th, 2023, President Joe Biden held his administration’s third annual White House Tribal Nations Summit in Washington, D.C. The Summit was attended by hundreds of Tribal leaders from across the United States. President Biden addressed Tribal...
On October 5, 2023, the Arizona Court of Appeals issued a decision upholding tribal jurisdiction and refusing to expand U.S. Supreme Court’s holding in Strate v. A-1 Contractors, 520 U.S. 438 (1997). In Strate, the Supreme Court ruled that a tribal court lacked civil...
On September 22, 2023, Senator Martin Heinrich (D-NM) and Senator Markwayne Mullin (R-OK), introduced S. 2908, the Indian Buffalo Management Act. The bill would establish a permanent program within the Department of the Interior to promote and develop the capacity of...
On October 30, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court denied the Klamath Irrigation District’s (KID) petition for certiorari of the Klamath Irrigation District v. United States Bureau of Reclamation, et al., case no. 22-1116. The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals had...
