Federal Government Continues to Give Native American Tribes a Bad Deal

The Department of the Interior has worked steadily to increase opportunity and access to the federal lands and resources under its purview. Earlier this week, the department released a comprehensive list of its accomplishments thus far in 2018.

One area that Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke should now turn his attention to is the morass of bad policies that have for years restricted opportunity for Native Americans on their own lands.

According to Terry Anderson, senior fellow at the Property and Environment Research Center, “In 2012, the Department of the Interior estimated that Indian lands have the potential to produce 5.35 billion barrels of oil, 37.7 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, and 53 billion tons of coal.”

Despite these vast resources, many tribal lands remain mostly undeveloped. “Eighty-eight percent of Indian lands with energy potential have yet to be developed,” according to Shawn Regan of the Property and Environment Research Center.

While some tribes have chosen not to develop resources, many—among them the Crow tribe—find it nearly impossible to do so in the face of the federal government’s overregulation and heavy-handed land management.