We caught this passage in President Obama's State of the Union speech this week and it made us sit up and take notice:
We may go at it in campaign season, but surely we can agree that the right to vote is sacred; that it's being denied to too many;
As one who has lost the right to vote, in tribal elections, stripped of that right by Democratic Party operatives Mark Macarro and Andy Masiel
, I sat up and took notice. Yes, voting rights have been stripped from Native Americans...by their own tribe. In fact, Macarro even tried to keep Californians from voting, REMEMBER?
Just this weekend, the Chukchansi tribe held "elections" to install an interim government, yet controlled the outcome by not allowing all members to vote. This tribe is so screwed up, that In 2013, Chukchansi had SEPARATE elections which makes it a WTF moment.
On the Pechanga Reservation in Temecula, Original Pechanga allottee descendents have had their citizenship taken away, along with voting rights, the right to health care, the right to speak at meeting, even when the situation is directly relating to them, such as water rights. It's virtual apartheid allowed because Pechanga, headed by Mark Macarro, the subject of a recall attempt, controls the votes. Hetried to usurp the water rights of allottees, lied to congressional staffers about how many allottees were still on the reservation.
Redding Rancheria even terminated 25% of their tribe, including their FIRST Tribal chairman. We have tribes like Snoqualmie in Washington, that have stripped citizenship simply for taking a position opposite of the tribal council. And the Picayune Rancheria already terminated 50% of their tribe and are looking at more.
How can this happen? BY CONTROLLING VOTES! Imagine stripping 8 million Californians of the right to vote. That's EXACTLY the comparision you should use when thinking about tribes like Redding, Pala, Pechanga and Chukchansi.
THE REAL PROBLEM, Mr. President, is that you let these actions continue under YOUR watch, and don't care about the violatons of the civil rights of THOUSANDS, but make up an unreal issue when addressing the nation. Get Eric Holder on the Job.
Know Ms Loretta Lynch, do something about violations of the civil rights of thousands of Native Americans who have been denied the right to vote and who have been as well disenrolled from their tribes by the so called leaders of their tribes. President Obama, you need to put your money where your mouth is where Native American Tribal members are concerned! How can you live with yourself fighting for the human and civil rights & committing billions of dollars and resources to so many other countries, where in your own back yard those human and civil rights are being being stripped from tribal members. You-all got it backwards!
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