Rift over California casino debate casts shadow on tribal forum
By AARON C. DAVIS
The Associated Press
SACRAMENTO
The organizer of a Democratic presidential forum that is expected to draw American Indian leaders from around the country to Southern California said opposition from a labor union has prompted top contenders to shy away from attending.
The fate of the event, called "Prez on the Rez" by its organizers, has become embroiled in a California political dispute sparked by wealthy gambling tribes' attempt to expand their casino operations.
Labor unions, close allies of the Democrats who control the state Legislature, are opposed to most of the tribes' efforts because they say the expansion deals will make it more difficult to organize casino workers.
The event is scheduled for Aug. 23 and promises to attract 2,500 tribal leaders and political organizers from more than 500 reservations nationwide.
A campaign official with one of the top Democratic candidates alerted Democratic National Committee members to the union opposition two weeks ago, said Kalyn Free, head of the Tulsa, Okla.-based nonprofit sponsoring the forum.
Free, a DNC member, has since flown to California and held meetings with union officials in an unsuccessful attempt to get their support. She said she also offered to let them co-sponsor it.
Only New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and Sen. Mike Gravel have confirmed. Free said Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Sen. Barack Obama and former Sen. John Edwards have yet to commit to the event, sponsored by the Indigenous Democratic Network List Education Fund. Calls to all three campaigns were not immediately returned Thursday.
DNC spokesman Luis Miranda said he could not immediately confirm if committee members had been contacted by campaigns about the Southern California forum. He did say the DNC has been generally supportive of Free's group and has worked with her in the past.
"It's up to the candidates to determine if they can make it to this forum or not," he said.
At stake for the candidates are potentially millions of dollars in campaign contributions from tribes that operate casinos, as well as access to Indian voters in key states.
"These tribal leaders are going to remember who came to 'Prez on the Rez,' and who didn't," Free said Thursday. "They've already said to me if Sen. Clinton, Sen. Obama and Sen. Edwards refuse to come, what can we expect from them when they are in the White House?"
The event will be held on the reservation of the Morongo Band of Missions, which operates a casino west of Palm Springs.
Morongo is one of several wealthy Southern California tribes that struck deals with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to greatly expand their casino operations in exchange for giving the state a share of their profits.
Under the deals with the governor, five tribes would add 22,500 slot machines, a near 40 percent increase in California's $7 billion a year tribal gambling industry.
The deals passed the Senate but have stalled in the Assembly, where majority Democrats are listening to the concerns of organized labor.
To pressure the Assembly into approving the casino expansion, the Morongo tribe launched a $20 million television advertising campaign that targeted the districts of key lawmakers. So far, that has only further angered Democrats in the Legislature.
Free, a former Justice Department lawyer who ran as a Democratic candidate for Congress from Oklahoma in 2004, said she was unaware that her group would run into a political maelstrom when she selected the Morongo reservation for the site of the political conference.
Free said she is frustrated the forum has been caught up in the conflict.
"We unwittingly stepped into this," she said.
The nonprofit is a sister organization to her independent campaign committee, the Indigenous Democratic Network.
A spokeswoman for the Morongo tribe did not immediately return a telephone call Thursday.
Despite the rift between the tribe and union, Jack Gribbon, California political director for Unite Here, said the union might be more supportive of the event if the tribes and unions strike a deal in the Legislature.
"Right now, if candidates were reluctant to attend because they were concerned about workers' right to organize, I would admire them for that," Gribbon said.
With the Democratic candidates being bombarded with invitations to speak, it's unlikely they would attend an event that is potentially controversial, said Bob Stern, president of the Center for Governmental Studies in Los Angeles.
"You have two very powerful interests that the Democrats want to appeal to, the traditional allies in the labor unions versus the Indians, who are the new allies, or at least the people with a lot of money right now. It's a no-win situation," Stern said.
Free, a member of the Choctaw tribe of Oklahoma, said she is planning get-out-the-vote efforts for Indians in some early primary states next year.
She said she will invite Republican candidates to the forum if the party's top contenders don't commit to the summer conference.
"Whoever comes, this is going to be a historic opportunity," Free said.
The Savage Opinion: This sort of thing is exactly why a lot of different ethnic grupos refuse to participate in the national electoral process. A lot of folks look at it as "why"? Seriously, the Republicans generally do not like anyone that's not 1) white, 2) rich, 3) Christian or 4) in favor of dismantling the earth for a few business opporunities. As Natives, generally, we are none of these things--I mean, granted, there are the fairer-skinned Savages of the world that have to explain, ad nauseum, how they came to look more like Mike Seaver and Heather Locklear (oh wait, she's supposedly Native too) than Will Sampson or Irene Bedard (or that one chick from "Dance me Outside" that wanted to get pregnant--she's bad!!!). Further, there are some Savages that are doing quite well with the pocketbook--if one of the chicks from those tribes (lessee--wish list, Agua Caliente, Morongo, Shakopee, Pequot....) want someone to clean their pool, Desperate Housewives style, let me know...
But by and large, those attributes are not us. Therefore, generally, it behooves us not too support too many Repugs.
But then the Democrats, the luscious liberals of the world, they do not do a lot better than Repugs oftentimes--this article is just one example. They typically ignore us, trying to figure us out from a safe distance--seeming scared when us Savages choose to fully utilize self-determination and self-governance, and not content to merely have the feds dictate how we're supposed to live. Another case in point was the Makah whale hunt--amazing how folks that were supposed to be liberal and thus "friends of the Native" became predictably racist and prone to paternalism when some ecological values (i.e. voters) got threatened.
My little rant. As Ms. Free ostensibly says, "our votes are there for the taking. they're not sworn to Dems just because they're Dems."
No comments:
Post a Comment