With All Deliberate Speed: Hearing Held on Deputy Interior Secretary Nominee

Despite high expectations, things have slowed down a little at the Interior Department. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has been the only confirmed nominee, and not much is happening on Indian affairs. However, former Clinton Administration Deputy Interior Secretary David J. Hayes is set to assume the same position under President Obama.

Hayes, an attorney, has been a partner at the Washington office of Latham & Watkins, well known as one of the leading environmental, energy, and natural resource law firms in the world. At Latham & Watkins, Hayes’ practice focused on counseling, litigation, and transactions, and he was, in effect, a lobbyist.

With a promised focus on tribal economic development, Hayes told the Senate Entergy and Natural Resources Committee that he is looking forward to “working with Native American communities,” which “was one of the most rewarding aspects of the job” when he worked at Interior in the Clinton era.

Although after leaving office last time around, Hayes was accused of violating anti-“revolving door” policies designed to prevent too much cozying up between lobbyists and government, a bipartisan investigation did not evidence that to be the case. Still, the relationship did not sit too well with Senator John McCain. Hayes did not represent any tribal clients during his time at Latham and Watkins.

The Committee will vote on Wednesday.

For more, see here, and see the Committee hearing here.

Ken Salazar Tapped to Head Interior Department

President-elect Obama has tapped Senator Ken Salazar (D-CO) to head the Department of the Interior. Salazar is former director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources and state attorney general. A first-term senator, he is a member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

Most of the attention given to the nomination will focus on Salazar’s moderate record on environmental, lands, and resources issues, which seems destined to please some and displease others. Virtually all commentators agree that Salazar is a reasonable and reasoned lawmaker, one who will be able to redeem Interior’s wild and wooly reputation as a lobbyists’ playground.

President-elect Obama sent an important signal, however, in introducing Salazar. In contrast to President Bush and his two nominees to head Interior (Gale Norton in 2000 and Dirk Kempthorne in 2006), both Obama and Salazar explicitly raised the subject of Indian Country.

This is significant because of the key role Interior plays in the federal government’s interactions with reservations and American Indian people. After all, the Interior Department oversees the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Office of the Special Trustee for American Indians. Too, the Office of Indian Gaming Management is responsible for implementing gaming-related policy assigned to the BIA through IGRA and other federal laws.

Salazar has little experience working with tribes or on issues related to Indian Country. In accepting the nomination, however, he did state that he looks forward to addressing “challenges” facing American Indian communities.

Obama sent an additional, critically important signal in discussing how the federal government should approach tribes. “We need more than just a government-to-government relationship; we need a nation-to-nation relationship,” he said.

This tracks with Obama’s campaign-trail pronouncements affirming tribal sovereignty. If taken literally, it goes further than prior presidential statements recognizing a government-to-government relationship. Nations are cultural and social communities; Obama’s statement seems to recognize the specificity of tribal cultural and social identity.

Still to come are Obama’s choices for a new White House liaison on Indian Affairs (so new that it’s never been done before), a new Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, a new Special Trustee for American Indians, and so on. These choices may extend to new members of the National Indian Gaming Commission, as well.

For right now, Ken Salazar is the cabinet appointee to watch.

The Obama Transition Team’s special designee on Indian affairs, Keith Harper, along with Native American Rights Fund Executive Director John Echohawk, will continue to advise Obama and now, Salazar, on positions of importance to Indian Country. We’ll keep you posted.

For more on Salazar's nomination, see the New York Times' coverage or click here.

Who’s the Key to the Transition for Indian Country?

Keith Harper, a member of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, is a Lead on Barack Obama’s Interior Department Review Team. This means he is in the process of shaping what the incoming administration’s Interior Department will look like in terms of personnel as well as ideological and political posture.

Harper is a partner and chairs the Native American Practice Group at a major D.C. law firm. He has been lead attorney on the never-ending Cobell trust land litigation, and was head of the D.C. office of the Native American Rights Fund (NARF). Before becoming a Review Team Lead, Harper advised Obama on Indian affairs throughout the campaign.

Those watching the transition expect an Interior Department whose posture toward federal Indian programs and federal Indian policy will change dramatically from that seen throughout Bush years. One might assume that American Indians will be more visible within the Department and in the Office of Indian Gaming Management, while the Department’s stance on key issues related to tribal gaming will change, as well. For instance, it is likely that the 2005 letter that changed the BIA’s policy on approving compacts for prospective gaming sites on land not yet held in trust will be up for review.

Expect more efforts to engage in government-to-government consultation with tribes, as well.

For now, there is little doubt that the man to watch is Harper.

More here and here.

Obama and Indian Country

Wow! We have a new tag for blog posts: Obama!

An historic election has come and gone, and now President-elect Obama has begun the process of building a transition team and his incoming administration. What will be the outlook for Indian Country? Let's try to suss out some informed predictions.

First, Obama is an empty vessel, with little record to examine concerning Indian Country. As outsiders, we can pour much into that empty vessel, at least in terms of expectations.

Second, as we all know, Obama faces enormous expectations across the board. This certainly is the case in Indian Country. He has been set up (and has set himself up) to succeed or fail –- and not much in between. Such high expectations are impossible to fulfill.

Now, let’s look at the basics. In terms of a general philosophy, Obama lines up pretty well with a Clintonian view in at least two ways: government generally can play an important role in generating opportunities for greater legal, political, social, and economic equality, and the federal government should support initiatives that promote American Indian tribal self-determination and economic development.

Given that, what specifics can we point to in terms of what we can expect? We’ll address those in the next post.