Washington Post Quotes Gabe Galanda Regarding Police "Partisanship and Political Ideology"

Gabe Galanda is quoted by The Washington Post in, “Police can’t decorate gear after they wore Blue Lives flags and killed Black man,” regarding the settlement obtained by the family of Timothy Green.

As reported:

The officer who fatally shot Timothy Green near a Washington state coffee shop wore gloves with a Blue Lives Matter emblem while attempting to treat his wounds. The on-scene commander had adorned his department-issued laptop with a badge showing a coiled rattlesnake and a mantra often understood by extremism researchers to represent right-wing, anti-government ideology.

Now, according to a settlement finalized last week between the city of Olympia, Wash., and the family of Green, a Black man who was having a psychotic episode when he was killed in 2022, Olympia police must stop personalizing city equipment. The city must also pay Green’s family $600,000.

As to the Blue Lives Matter emblems and anti-government badge displayed by Olympia police officer when Timothy was killed, Gabe is quoted as follows:

“This is not unique to the city of Olympia — this is happening countrywide,” said Gabe Galanda, one of the Green family’s attorneys. “Whatever law enforcement is doing, they have to be above partisanship or political ideology.”

Gabe Galanda is an Indigenous rights attorney and the managing lawyer at Galanda Broadman. He has been named to Best Lawyers in America in the fields of Native American Law and Gaming Law from 2007 to 2024, and dubbed a Super Lawyer by his peers from 2013 to 2024.

Gabe Galanda, Shelby Stoner Ranked Among Best Lawyers in America

Gabe Galanda and Shelby Stoner’s peers have named them both to the prestigious Best Lawyers in America list for 2025.

Gabe has been honored among the Best Lawyers in America® in Native American and gaming law for the eighteenth consecutive year. He has also been dubbed a Super Lawyer by his peers from 2013 to 2024. He is the managing lawyer at Galanda Broadman.

Shelby has been named “One to Watch” by Best Lawyers in America in the fields of environmental and labor and employment litigation. She was also named a Rising Star by by Super Lawyers® magazine in 2024. She is Of Counsel at Galanda Broadman.

Three Galanda Broadman Indigenous Rights Lawyers Honored by Super Lawyers

Indigenous rights lawyers Gabe Galanda (Round Valley), Amber Penn-Roco (Chehalis), and Shelby Stoner were each honored by Super Lawyers magazine for 2024. Gabe was named a “Super Lawyer” and Amber and Shelby “Rising Stars,” all in the field of Native American Law.

Gabe’s practice focuses on complex, multi-party litigation and crisis management, representing Indigenous nations, businesses and citizens.

Amber’s practice focuses on tribal sovereignty issues, including environmental issues, economic development, and complex Indian Country litigation.

Shelby’s practice focuses on high-impact cases involving tribal law, Indigenous rights and other civil rights matters, land and environmental issues, and appellate litigation.

With eight lawyers and offices in Seattle and Yakima, Washington and Bend, Oregon, the firm is dedicated to advancing and protecting Indigenous rights.

New York Times Quotes Gabe Galanda Regarding Tribal Gaming "Arms Race"

Gabe Galanda is quoted in The New York Times regarding what he dubs an off-reservation gaming “arms race” between Tribal nations in the Pacific Northwest.

“We’re now seeing an arms race,” said Gabriel S. Galanda, an Indigenous rights lawyer representing the Cow Creek Umpqua tribe, whose Seven Feathers casino, just an hour north of Medford on Interstate 5, would be faced with new competition. “You can literally look at the dominoes falling in every direction, from Washington to Oregon, and Oregon to California.”

Earlier this year, Gabe was quoted by the Los Angeles Times on the same subject. He is concerned about how the inter-Tribal arms race us causing time-honored kinship bonds between Tribal nations to fissure and fracture. As Gabe explains in his recent scholarly essay that the LA Times featured:

Tribal gaming politicians seek to develop casinos in other ways that are antithetical to inter-Tribal kinship. They are emboldened by the United States, which is “allowing Tribes to acquire land for casinos in areas to which they have no historical connection, and are in many instances, the ancestral homelands of other Indigenous peoples.”

On Secretary Deb Haaland’s watch, as The New York Times explains, the Interior Department recently “made it much easier for the federal government to take other lands into trust for the benefit of tribes” and “widened the possibilities for using those new lands for gambling projects.”

Gabe expresses concern that now “Interior will ‘presume’ an off-reservation gaming trust acquisition is in a Tribal applicant’s best interest, without regard for other Tribal nations’ ancestral, historical, or Treaty interests.” He criticizes that policy as an “over-correction” that is antithetical to age-old inter-Tribal kinship systems:

The Biden administration’s policy fosters an every-Tribe-for-itself mentality, encourages Tribal politicians to dishonor ancestry and manipulate anthropology, and threatens the extended kinship proposition….With Indigenous kinship responsibilities impinged and ancestral relations desecrated for economic gain, the inter-Tribal conflicts are quite personal and prone to spilling over into other arenas where solidarity is needed to protect Tribal nationhood or Indigenous humanity.

The Coquille Tribe’s off-reservation gaming project in Medford exemplifies these concerns. Coquille has falsely claimed an ancestral connection tot he Rogue Valley, which caused three northern California Tribal Chairman to publish a column in The Oregonian titled “History Matters”:

There are no Indigenous teachings or other historical evidence of ancestral ties between the Coquille People and the Rogue River Valley. It is most telling that there is no linguistic connection between the Coquille and the Takelman and Shastan speakers of the Rogue River Valley. Historically speaking, the Coquille simply did not exist in Medford.

Unless there is a federal and inter-Tribal course correction, Tribal false histories and gaming greed will overthrow Indigenous kinship traditions and places. Where would that leave us as Indigenous peoples?

Gabe Galanda is an Indigenous rights attorney and the managing lawyer at Galanda Broadman. He has been named to Best Lawyers in America in the fields of Native American Law and Gaming Law from 2007 to 2024, and dubbed a Super Lawyer by his peers from 2013 to 2024.

Shelby Stoner Joins Galanda Broadman

Shelby Stoner has joined Galanda Broadman PLLC as Of Counsel, focusing on complex litigation involving Tribal nations and enterprises and Indigenous citizens. Shelby also provides employment counsel to Tribal employers.

“We are ecstatic to have Shelby join our team,” said Gabriel S. Galanda, Managing Lawyer of Galanda Broadman. “She brings deep courtroom and litigation experience to our Tribal and Indigenous clients.”

Shelby joins the firm after clerking for the Hon. Eric D. Miller of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the Hon. Thomas S. Zilly of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington. In addition, Shelby previously worked as a litigation associate at K&L Gates LLP, where she represented the Duwamish Tribe in its pursuit for federal recognition.

Shelby graduated from the University of Washington School of Law in 2017, where she graduated with high honors and served as an Articles Editor of the Washington Law Review. She holds a Master of Arts in International Affairs from Columbia University and a Bachelor of Arts in International Studies from the University of Washington.

Before law school, Shelby worked in the nonprofit sector, focusing on global economic development, women’s rights, youth development, and education. She also served as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Middle East.

Shelby lives on the Olympic Peninsula where she enjoys cycling, hiking, boating, reading fiction, and spending time with her family. Shelby serves on the Board of Directors of the Bainbridge Island Art Museum (BIMA) and the Bainbridge Ballet Performance Group. She is also active in her children’s elementary school parent-teacher organization (PTO) and Spanish immersion program. 

Galanda Broadman is an Indigenous rights law firm with offices in Seattle and Yakima, Washington and Bend, Oregon. The firm is dedicated to advancing Indian Treaty and other tribal sovereign legal rights as well as Indigenous human rights.

“Nooksack 306” Documentary to Premiere Tuesday Night in Seattle

Produced by Converge Media, the Film Will Be Shown at The Iconic Egyptian Theater During Seattle’s Scope Screenings

On Tuesday night, June 25, a new documentary film made by Converge Media, “Nooksack 306,” will premiere during the Scope Screenings Film Festival.  A trailer for the movie can be watched here.

The short digital movie dives into the struggle faced by Indigenous people who are being disenrolled by tribal politicians and threatened with losing their homes and being exiled from their homelands.

Converge Media profiles members of the group of disenrolled Nooksack Indigenous people known as the Nooksack 306.  Last year, the family allowed the filmmakers access to their daily lives in Deming, Washington, sharing the story of their twelve-year political persecution.

“We are proud to be able to help tell this story and share the message of the challenges that are facing the Nooksack 306,” said Converge Media’s Head of Production, Alaia D’Alessandro. “This film highlights Converge Media’s dedication to uplifting the voices of those who’s stories need amplification and we hope it will raise awareness and make a difference.”

Following a lack of human rights protection by both the Trump and Biden administrations, the United Nations has twice intervened, raising concerns about the unlawful disenrollment of the Nooksack and related ejectment of several Nooksack families from federally subsidized homes they are entitled to own, without any legal protections.  

“Having been denied access to the courts and any human rights protection from this country, the Nooksack 306 have taken their fight to the United Nations and the court of public opinion,” said the Nooksack families’ lawyer, Gabe Galanda. “This is an existential fight for the ages.”

With the United Nations poised to further intervene, pressure is mounting upon the Biden administration, particularly U.S. Interior Department Secretary Deb Haaland, to take some action to protect the Nooksack families’ internationally recognized human rights to housing and belonging.

“It is time for the Biden administration to be consistent about international human rights,” continued Galanda. “Right now, the administration appears highly inconsistent. The United States actively professes to be a beacon of human rights protection abroad, while ignoring egregious human rights violations at home.”

The Nooksack families most recently called upon Secretary Haaland to halt their evictions, which appear imminent. Secretary Haaland is the first Indigenous cabinet Secretary in American history, and she possesses complete authority over Indigenous affairs and lands.

The protracted legal and political battle has ramifications across generations, as grandparents, parents, and children have been catapulted into the fight to remain in their community and keep their homes, many of which have been in the families for decades. This film tells the story from the perspective of those whose voices have been stifled, sharing their Indigenous traditions and amplifying their pleas for support.  

Empowered by the movie, the United Nations’ unprecedented interventions, and other public support, the Nooksack 306 say they aren’t going anywhere.

“We have always been Nooksack and will always be Nooksack,” said Michelle Roberts, who, as a spokesperson for the Nooksack 306 and a credited producer of the documentary, is facing housing eviction. “We have no intention of abandoning our homes or homelands. We belong, our ancestors belonged, and we are staying put.”

SCOTUS Holds IHS Failed its Funding Obligations; Tribes Should Act Now

By Corinne Sebren

On June 6, 2024, in a major victory for tribal health care programs, the United States Supreme Court ruled on the consolidated cases of Becerra v. San Carlos Apache Tribe (No. 23-250) and Becerra v. Northern Arapaho Tribe (No. 23-253).

In its ruling, the Supreme Court affirmed the Ninth and Tenth Circuit’s earlier decisions, and held that IHS is required to cover the reasonable costs incurred by Tribes when they utilize revenues from third-party payers (e.g., Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance). 

The High Court’s decision, authored by Chief Justice Roberts, explained that “[b]ecause a self-determination contract requires a tribe to spend program income to further the programs transferred to it in the contract,” the statutory provisions of the ISDEAA “require IHS to pay contract support costs when a tribe does so, just as IHS must pay contract support costs to support a tribe’s spending of the Secretarial amount [i.e., amounts determined through congressional appropriation].”

Chief Justice Roberts was joined by Justices Gorsuch, Jackson, Kagan, Gorsuch, and Sotomayor. Justice Kavanaugh was joined in dissent by Justices Thomas, Alito, and Barrett.

The Court explained that reimbursement of the full amount of contract support costs is necessary to “prevent a funding gap between tribes and IHS,” which would inflict “a penalty for pursuing self-determination” on those Tribes that choose to exercise their rights to operate health care programs under the ISDEAA.

Tribes and Tribal Organizations Should Act Now

The Court’s decision in Becerra confirms the right of Tribes operating healthcare programs under the ISDEAA to obtain payment of contract support costs (CSC) for all activities that are required for compliance with the Tribe’s ISDEAA contract/compact “includ[ing] the third-party-revenue-funded portions of the program.”

The federal government is now required to pay reasonable direct and indirect support costs to Tribes and Tribal organizations that administer healthcare programs under ISDEAA agreements.

All eligible tribal health care programs operating under a 638 contract (or a compact) with IHS to provide health services should act swiftly to present claims and secure the cost reimbursement to which they are entitled. These claims have a six-year statute of limitations, and we expect IHS to strictly enforce this limitations period. It is therefore critical for Tribes and Tribal organizations to act now.

If you would like to request a consult related to filing such a claim, contact the author or another member of the Galanda Broadman team.

Corinne Sebren is an associate with Galanda Broadman. Her practice focuses on civil rights, Indigenous health law, regulatory analysis, and complex litigation.

Pressure Mounts on Deb Haaland to Confront Domestic Indigenous Human Rights Abuse

Indigenous people from throughout the country are calling upon U.S. Interior Department Secretary Deb Haaland to address Indigenous human rights violations that have continued during the Biden administration. 

As the first Indigenous presidential cabinet member, Secretary Haaland has gone to great lengths to reckon with historical injustices suffered by Indigenous people in America, but she has increasingly ignored current human rights abuses on Indian lands.

In northern Washington state, for example, dozens of Nooksack Indigenous family members are being ejected from their federal rent-to-own homes without due process. The United Nations has twice told the Biden administration to halt those human rights violations, only to have the U.S. State Department cite “tribal sovereignty” as its excuse for inaction.  

Secretary Haaland was personally made aware of the injustice at Nooksack in early 2022, when it made the front page of the New York Times, but she’s since shied away from it. The Nooksack families recently asked her to honor the UN’s pleas, by halting impending evictions. Secretary Haaland’s office declined to meet with the families. See "U.N. has spoken, now Inslee, Biden should intervene in Nooksack Tribe eviction dispute.”

In central California, hundreds of citizens of the Picayune Rancheria of the Chukchansi Indians are being ejected from their Tribe also without due process.  The Biden administration has ignored those Indigenous citizens’ repeated pleas for human rights protection, despite at least two federal laws allowing for Secretary Haaland’s intervention in unlawful disenrollment actions. When she was in the U.S. House of Representatives, Secretary Haaland promised to address disenrollment, but she did not.

In eastern Oklahoma, at least four Tribal nations that signed Reconstruction Era Treaties that promise Tribal citizenship rights to those nations’ freed slaves, now refuse to confer citizenship to those commonly known as the Freedmen. Secretary Haaland “encouraged” those four Tribal nations’ “to meet their moral and legal obligations to Freedmen,” but stopped short of enforcing those federal Treaty promises.

In upstate New York, both Cayuga Nation citizens and the Seneca County Board of Supervisors implored Secretary Haaland to protect civil rights on Tribal lands, after “the deployment of an apparently illegitimate tribal police force, erosion of property rights [i.e. the bulldozing of tribal buildings], and confusion as to civil rights and obligations for both tribal and non-tribal members of the local community.” It appears Secretary Haaland ignored the situation altogether.

These injustices arise in great part because there is no federal Bill of Rights protection in Indian Country, and the federal Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968—the so-called Indian Bill of Rights—was gutted by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1978.

Secretary Haaland has used her historic platform to bring justice to the families of murdered and missing Indigenous people and to the survivors of Indian boarding schools.  But she has stopped short of using her platform to help stem the human rights abuse presently suffered by Indigenous people on Tribal lands.

Federal officials are loath to confront human rights violations on Tribal lands for fear of being criticized as “anti-Tribal,” or losing political support from wealthy gaming Tribes. Certain prominent Tribal gaming politicians with direct access to Secretary Haaland, have committed human rights abuses themselves.

With aspirations of next serving as New Mexico’s Governor, amid a bitter game of thrones with U.S. Senator Mark Heinrich, Secretary Haaland is certainly playing it safe. “Auntie Deb,” as her political handlers and allies affectionately call her, appears afraid of doing anything that would be perceived as an affront to Tribal nationalism. This has caused Indigenous cultural people to increasingly question her courage.

Quoting federal statutes, the Nooksack families reminded Secretary Haaland how she is uniquely empowered to help protect Indigenous human rights:

You are the highest ranking federal Indian affairs Official in the United States.  You are “charged with the supervision of public business relating to . . . Indians.”  You “shall . . . have the management of all Indian affairs and of all matters arising out of Indian relations.”… As the first Indigenous cabinet Secretary in United States history, you also have moral authority and responsibility to defend and protect [Indigenous] human rights.

As the Biden administration actively works to promote and protect her legacy, it is not too late for Secretary Haaland to bravely confront the injustices Indigenous people are suffering here and now.

Will she or won’t she?

Gabe Galanda is an Indigenous rights attorney and the managing lawyer at Galanda Broadman. He has been named to Best Lawyers in America in the fields of Native American Law and Gaming Law from 2007 to 2024, and dubbed a Super Lawyer by his peers from 2013 to 2024.

Gabe Galanda on Tribal Disenrollment: "This Country Does Not Care"

Gabe Galanda is quoted at length by Fresno news stations KSEE24 and CBS47, regarding the latest scourge of disenrollment at the Picayune Rancheria of Chukchansi Indians.

In a digital news story, “Chukchansi using ‘paper genocide’ for more casino money, former council members say,” Gabe sounds off on this country’s indifference to Indigenous human rights abuse in Indian country:

“Disenrollment isn’t about ascertaining historical truth,” said Indigenous rights lawyer Gabriel Galanda. “It’s about accomplishing a certain political goal, which is eradicating and exiling political opponents.”

Galanda says systematic and unjustified disenrollment is a problem across tribes and is in itself an inhumane practice.

“It’s hard to imagine anything more inhumane than telling a youth who has grown up believing they belong somewhere – and now they’re being told they don’t belong,” Galanda said. “That is the height of indignity and inhumanity in America.”…

“What disenrollment really accomplishes is it cuts out the safety net of an Indigenous person from underneath them – social service benefits, educational benefits, health care benefits, or general welfare benefits.”

Galanda says the worst part is that nothing can be done about it since Chukchansi is a sovereign nation.

“Yes, they can do whatever they want with or without regard for tribal law and there is nobody in the country who cares enough to do anything about it,” Galanda said.

For those disenrolled, Galanda says he wishes he could spread hope, it’s all too little too late at this point.

“Tragically, I have no hope that these relatives will be saved from disenrollment or exile,” Galanda said.

“The cold, the cold, hard truth is that this country does not care about them. It does not care about the health and welfare of the first peoples of this country.”

Gabe Galanda is an Indigenous rights attorney and the managing lawyer at Galanda Broadman. He has been named to Best Lawyers in America in the fields of Native American Law and Gaming Law from 2007 to 2024, and dubbed a Super Lawyer by his peers from 2013 to 2024. His law review article, “Curing the Tribal Disenrollment Epidemic: In Search of a Remedy,” was published by Arizona Law Review in 2015.

Gabe Galanda Explains "Acutely Unhealthy" Effects of Indigenous Human Rights Void

Last Friday, Gabe Galanda delivered the opening remarks at the Legal Foundation of Washington’s event, Changing the Way We See Native America, at Seattle’s iconic Town Hall.

The event celebrated LFW’s $4 million investment in Indigenous civil legal aid.

Gabe also emceed the event and introduced the night’s keynote speaker, Matika Wilbur. Here’s the first part of his opening remarks.

We are here in celebration and the Legal Foundation of Washington’s $4M commitment to expand Indigenous civil legal aid in our state.

This investment is crucial because only 1 on 10 Indigenous persons in our state receive civil legal assistance.

9 out of 10 Indigenous people don’t get legal help, whether for housing, family, employment, public assistance, civil rights, other problems.

90% don’t get the legal help they need, when they need it the most.  That is a truth that we cannot accept.

According to a 2015 Washington State Supreme Court Civil Legal Aid report, the top problems faced by Indigenous people includes:

·      Denial of services from a Tribal government or community organization that serves Indigenous people; and

·      Discrimination or employment termination by a tribe or tribally owned business.

That results in large part from the fact that Tribal citizens are the only so-called natural born citizens in this country that do not universally enjoy federal Bill of Rights protection.

That thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1978, when Thurgood Marshall ruled that the federal Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968 did not allow Indigenous people to seek protection in federal court when their personal freedoms were violated by Tribal governments.

The Supreme Court’s concern was flooding the federal courts with Indigenous civil rights cases.

Nearly 50 years later, the overwhelming majority of Tribal citizens in this country have nowhere to turn legally or judicially when their safety net it cut out from under them.

What this means is our Tribal citizens live their daily lives without the freedoms lived as a result of constitutional legal protections: freedom of speech/assembly, the right to personal privacy, the right to equal protection, the right to due process at law, to name a few. That reality breads an acutely unhealthy insecurity in Indigenous daily life.

We don’t even enjoy so-called birthright citizenship according to the 14th Amendment. 

Sunday was the 100th anniversary of the federal Indian Citizenship Act, which granted Tribal citizens American citizenship.

It took this country 150 years for the first people of these lands to be recognized as U.S. citizens, for voting purpose.

And today, our U.S. citizenship exists only at the will of the United States Congress, not by virtue of the 14th Amendment.  Think about that for a moment.

Even worse, there isn’t a single national organization in the country that is dedicated to the advancement of Indigenous civil liberties or human rights.

There is no Southern Poverty Law Center or NAACP Legal Defense Fund for Indigenous people.  Pioneering human rights organizations like the ACLU, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch, are afraid to intercede, for fear of being seen as anti-Tribal or racist.

Which gets me back to the 9 out of 10 Indigenous people who don’t get civil legal aid, especially when being denied services or being discriminated against by Tribal governments or community organizations. 

Without Bill of Rights protection, any legal aid effort very well may be futile, and that is another truth that we cannot accept. 

And that unacceptable truth is why the Legal Foundation of Washington’s $4M investment in Indigenous civil legal aid is so important, and so commendable.

Gabe’s remarks have been edited for clarity.

Gabe Galanda is an Indigenous rights attorney and the managing lawyer at Galanda Broadman. He has been named to Best Lawyers in America in the fields of Native American Law and Gaming Law from 2007 to 2024, and dubbed a Super Lawyer by his peers from 2013 to 2024.