Rights Protest at Pechanga

The Pechanga Tribe is one of the most notorious of the gambling casino tribes when it comes to the treatment of their own people. They have disenrolled hundreds of tribal members, targeting dissenters who had the audacity to question the leadership. On Saturday February 2, 2008 at the Pechanga Casino in Temecula people will gather to protest this self-styled dictatorial regime and its policies - and its plans to add thousands of slot machines. From Original Pechanga's Blog:

"No Rights, No Compact!"
Saturday, February 2, 2008 @ 10 am
Pechanga Resort & Casino
Temecula, CA

Pechanga tribal officials have signed a compact with the State of California that would authorize the largest expansion of casino gambling in U.S. history. Yet Pechanga tribal officials have tried continuously to keep California voters from exercising their Constitutional right to participate in the referendum process. First, they tried to block voters from signing petitions. This failed as nearly 3 million signatures were gathered to put the deals on the ballot. Next, Pechanga filed a lawsuit to keep the Prop 94 from going to the voters- this also failed.

Why are Pechanga officials so eager to deny California voters their right to decide this issue when it was California voters who approved gaming on Indian lands in the first place? Could it be that the Pechanga officials know that its "sweetheart deals" may not hold up to voter scrutiny?

No Rights, No Compact!

It should come as no surprise that a tribe that has denied its own members basic rights guaranteed by tribal laws and the Constitution would work so hard and spend so much money to deny other Californians their rights as well. Should you really expect Pechanga officials to value and respect the rights of others when they have not done the same for their own citizens?

Due process and equal protection of the law are hard to come by at Pechanga. Throw in blatant disregard for the Constitution and lack of protection of basic rights, and you will begin to understand why nearly 300 Pechanga members have been stripped of their citizenship- and many hundreds more denied membership- since California voters approved tribal gaming and Pechanga became one of the wealthiest tribes in the State.

Please join us on February 2nd to protest the rights violations committed by Pechanga tribal officials, and please vote No on Prop 94.

Members question tribe - and get kicked out...

...oh color me so surprised! To begin with it cannot be said there has been sufficient proof provided that any of the so-called tribal members are indeed the descendants they claim to be. That some of these so-called tribal member can decide 'who is' and 'who is not' is ironic and almost funny. Almost. It becomes alarming when you hear tales of dis-enrollment as the cure for anyone with the audacity to question tribal leadership or practices. It effectively gives casino tribes the ability to hide anything. Anything at all. From CNN:


Indian tribes expel members

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island (AP) -- Dennis Champlain's grandfather helped win federal recognition for the Narragansett Indian Tribe. Champlain himself has danced in tribal powwows and teaches his children that they are Narragansetts.

Dennis Champlain and his extended family were removed from the rolls of the Narragansett Indian Tribe.

Yet the Narragansetts say he is no longer a member of the tribe.

Champlain and his extended family are among thousands of people removed from American Indian tribes in recent years, often amid tribal squabbles or when a casino comes to town. In Rhode Island, the Narragansetts' removal of about 140 of roughly 2,400 members has become an issue in Saturday's election for the tribe's chief sachem, or leader.

Tribal officials say they have the right to decide who is a member and to prevent fraud by people angling for a share of gambling money. But many of those kicked out complain they have little recourse to fight what amounts to an attack on their identity.

"We're in the process of a redefinition of tribal identity at its core," said David Wilkins, a political scientist at the University of Minnesota and a member of North Carolina's Lumbee Tribe. "It's ramping up in a way that's really quite frightening to a lot of Native people."

Wilkins traces most purges to four factors: internal political squabbles, stricter racial requirements for membership, punishment for gang or drug-related crime and, most often, during debates over sharing casino profits.

A 1978 U.S. Supreme Court ruling said the federal government should not intervene in most tribal membership disputes, leaving appeals up to the tribes.

Tribal casinos generated $25 billion in revenue last year, according to the National Indian Gaming Commission. Tribes often split the profits by making payments to members. Fewer members can mean a larger paycheck for those left.

But that paycheck can lure people with dubious claims of ancestry. The Pechanga Band of California said it was deluged with membership claims after it opened its casino in 1995.

John Gomez Jr., 39, a Pechanga member since childhood, was kicked out in 2004. He said gambling profits were one factor: He lost free health care and a $15,000 monthly payment. But he said he and others had questioned leaders before a tribal election.

"I think a lot of it has to do with the money, but there's a lot of it that's also about the politics," said Gomez, who co-founded the American Indian Rights and Resources Organization, a group that lobbies against expelling tribe members.

The Pechanga council has said it cut members who should never have been let in.

It's not clear how many people have been removed from tribes in the last few years. There are 562 federally recognized tribes, and tribal governments are not required to report citizenship decisions. But the number is in the thousands.

Gomez's advocacy group counts at least 1,500 people ousted from 13 tribes in California.

In Michigan, the Saginaw Chippewa want to remove about a tenth of their 2,700 members due to rules that require them to be at least one-quarter Indian. Critics said it's an attempt to cut casino payments.

The Cherokee Nation voted in March to deny citizenship to an estimated 2,800 descendants of tribal slaves.

In the Narragansett election, Paulla Dove Jennings, a historian, is running an underdog campaign against the incumbent, Matthew Thomas, saying it is unfair to take people's identities as Narragansetts away.

The tribe began a review of its roster about three years ago amid a failed push to build a casino -- but there is a dispute over why. Thomas said a tribal assembly, similar to a town meeting, voted to verify all tribal membership before adding several children to the roster.

But Leslie Champlain, a cousin of Dennis Champlain, said she attended the meeting and believes the tribe did not approve an audit. She suspects tribal leadership wanted to root out dissent after her sister, a tribal councilwoman, demanded a detailed audit showing how the tribe spent millions of dollars, some of it from the gambling company Harrah's Entertainment Inc.

Thomas called Champlain's claim "ridiculous" and said he is bound by the decisions of the tribal assembly and cannot be held responsible for someone else's ancestry.

Members were asked to prove they descend from ancestors listed on an 1880 census using birth, death and marriage certificates. The Champlains had used other documents as recently as 1994. This time, it was not enough.

Dennis Champlain said he learned his family was kicked out by reading about it in a newspaper. Thomas said members can appeal to a tribal court, but the Champlains say no one ever told them how to appeal.

Dennis Champlain does not blame his fellow Narragansetts, but he calls the process unjust.

"It's not a matter of whether it's right or wrong," he said. "It's a matter of who has the power. The tribe has the power -- we don't."