Finding a Voice in Politics

Bruce Whalen sighed heavily as he walked the old reservation neighborhood, talking to American Indians about something many never do: go to the polls and vote.

Along the way, he passed boarded-up homes and barbed wire fences, cars with shattered windshields and half-wild packs of “rez dogs” parading down the street.

“This is despair,” said Whalen, a political organizer and Oglala Lakota raised on the Pine Ridge Reservation near the border with Nebraska. “Outsiders call this place a Third World country. But the people who live here want change.”

Activists such as Whalen and Cecilia Fire Thunder are encouraging Indians to pursue change -- and break generations of historical and cultural barriers -- with a bigger voice in American politics. And they’re getting help from tribal elders: Pine Ridge has moved its tribal polling day to Nov. 2 to coincide with federal and state elections, making it easier for the 12,000 voting-age residents to participate in both.

Many see Whalen as a harbinger, battling his tribe’s rampant unemployment, addiction and spousal abuse through the ballot box. The 42-year-old college student is working on behalf of Republican John Thune, who is running to represent South Dakota in the U.S. Senate. Whalen believes Thune will bring fresh ideas to the reservation.

From the Dakotas and Oklahoma to Arizona, California and Washington state, the Navajo, Cherokee, Yakama and other Native American tribes are being aggressively courted by both parties this year like never before.

Candidates took a greater interest after watching how tribes helped turn elections in Washington and South Dakota in 2000 and 2002, as well as how American Indians voted to support gaming initiatives in several states.

In what may be a close race for president this year, such a voting bloc could be pivotal in swing states with large Indian populations, such as Arizona, New Mexico and Washington.

Many tribes now use gaming profits to hire lobbyists to push Indian causes. They’re also funding ambitious get-out-the-vote efforts across isolated reservations without rural address numbering systems and where many residents live without automobiles or telephones. The National Congress of American Indians has pledged to register a million new voters in 2004 alone.

The message: Though long detached from the American political system, Indians can make a difference, electing candidates who can improve life on and off the reservations.

Although there are no statistics on general election voter turnout among the nation’s 4.1-million Native Americans, experts estimate the figure to be between 20% and 40% -- significantly below the nation’s average turnout of 50%. Indians vote more often in tribal elections, achieving rates as high as 70%.

The new push for Indian votes was apparent this spring at a national tribal conference during which nearly all the Democratic presidential candidates talked up such issues as Indian self-determination and small-business development. The Republican National Committee developed its first Native American website this year. And Arizona GOP officials will canvas the Navajo reservation with Navajo-language brochures.

Native Americans are responding to the organizing efforts -- and having success.

In 2000, Northwest tribes raised more than half a million dollars for an advertising campaign to help defeat U.S. Sen. Slade Gorton (R-Wash.), who was viewed as anti-Indian for challenging tribal sovereignty. Two years later, South Dakota tribes worked together to help elect Democrat Tim Johnson to the Senate over Republican Thune.

But many Native Americans think non-Indians don’t want them to vote. The American Civil Liberties Union went to trial this month after filing a lawsuit against state officials for allegedly redrawing congressional districts to weaken the Indian vote. And South Dakota’s 2002 Senate race was marred by accusations of voter fraud and racism.

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Shortly before midnight Nov. 6, 2000, Thune had surged ahead in the race for one of South Dakota’s U.S. Senate seats by 3,000 votes.

Johnson went to bed sensing defeat -- only to awaken hours later to a welcome surprise: Late-counted votes from the Pine Ridge Reservation won him the race by 524 votes.

This year, in a race for the state’s other Senate seat, Thune is running against Democratic incumbent Tom Daschle. Already, he is meeting with tribal officials across the state, taking time to play pickup basketball with Indian teens.

“Treatment of Indians by past generations is not something this state can be proud of,” he said in an interview. “I can’t change the past. But I can help change the future.”

Republican Sens. Pete V. Domenici of New Mexico and John McCain of Arizona are among the lawmakers and state officials who have sought Indian support. McCain, who has defended the unique legal status of tribes as sovereign nations, received their backing and contributions when he ran for president four years ago.

“It doesn’t matter what side of the aisle they’re on,” said W. Ron Allen, former president of the National Congress of American Indians. “If they support our issues, we’ll support them.”

Native American voters -- who make up 8% of South Dakota’s 750,000 residents -- could decide a June 1 special election to fill a congressional seat vacated when Republican Rep. William J. Janklow pleaded guilty to manslaughter after a fatal traffic accident.

The Indian vote, however, may be unpredictable. Although the nation’s 557 tribes have voted predominantly Democratic, most tribal political donations in 2002 for the first time went to Republican candidates.

“Most Indians share Republican values,” said Paul DeMain, managing editor of News From Indian Country, a semimonthly newspaper based in Hayward, Wis. “They’re pro-life. They gravitate toward military service. Despite their history with the U.S. government, there has always been this intrinsic notion that you serve your country.”

Yet, DeMain added, most Indian voters think the Democratic Party has been more supportive of minorities and anti-poverty programs.

Tribes with gaming operations on their reservations possess the monetary clout to push their causes. Although tribes spent almost nothing on federal elections in 1990, they’ve contributed $8.6 million on congressional and presidential races since 1993, advocacy groups say.

Still, many reservations are isolated and present logistical hurdles that contribute to the traditionally low Indian voting rate. Polling places can be 40 miles away, and contacting potential supporters is sometimes difficult.

“How do you poll a district where there are no phones, or people don’t speak your language?” asked Arizona Democratic Party spokeswoman Sarah Rosen.

About half the country’s Native Americans live off reservations. But even those with closer access to the ballot box are not necessarily more apt to participate in politics, Indian leaders say.

There are cultural roadblocks as well. Even after the Citizenship Act of 1924 gave American Indians the right to vote, many tribal members have felt excluded from the process.

At Pine Ridge, non-Indian workers often make polling places a hostile environment, according to a report by Daniel McCool, director of the American West Center at the University of Utah.

One voter told McCool that in several recent elections, poll workers treated him and other Indians like “we [were] doing something wrong.” Another said whites at the polls called him a “drunken Indian.”

The South Dakota Legislature passed a law that this year requires all voters there to show a driver’s license, another form of photo identification -- or sign a statement attesting to their identity -- before they can cast a ballot. State officials say the law will help ensure no one votes in someone else’s name. But Indians, many of whom do not drive or have state licenses, say the law is racist.

“There’s a long history of Indians having been discouraged from voting,” said McCool. “In the past, many were warned: ‘These are white man elections; they’re not your concern.’ These days, such racism is more subtle.”

In 2002, a woman from eastern South Dakota was charged in connection with casting phony ballots, and law enforcement visited several Native American voting sites, looking for evidence. Charges of voter fraud ultimately were proven false.

Now Native American observers monitor many voting sites on South Dakota reservations to make fellow Indians feel welcome.

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Whalen sees them, the legions of heavy drinkers who stagger the two miles from Pine Ridge village to White Clay, Neb., which sits just outside the reservation. Although alcohol is banned on the reservation, three package stores just outside its limits cater to willing customers.

Alcoholism is chronic on the Pine Ridge Reservation, an isolated swath of Indian-owned land located amid the rugged South Dakota badlands, a place where as many as four out of five people are out of work.

Rectangular-shaped, 100 miles long and 50 miles wide -- featuring communities such as Wounded Knee, Porcupine and Potato Creek -- Pine Ridge spans three counties that are among the nation’s poorest places. The average annual individual income is $3,500.

Whalen tells Pine Ridge residents how after leaving the area for years, he returned to see their reservation deteriorated: “I can see the forest. And I can see the trees.”

When he talks to elders, Whalen is always deferential, never speaking until spoken to. He listens as 29-year-old Army veteran Dennis Janis says he plans to vote for Daschle this year “because my wife’s friend is close to him.”

Whalen shakes his head. He calls Daschle a wasicu (pronounced wha-see-chu), a Lakota word for someone who hoards the best part of the meat.

Another man emerges from a yard ringed by barbed wire and tells Whalen: “I’ll be honest. I don’t vote.” Whalen tells him his vote is important, now more than ever. The man rubs his chin and doesn’t say a word.

Later, Whalen hangs his head. “I get depressed here,” he said. “It’s not like we’ve cornered the market on poverty, but we’re among the poorest places in America, and it seems that some people here are determined to stay that way.”

Down at Big Bat’s gas station and deli, Whalen’s Democratic get-out-the-vote rival talks with residents. At 57, Cecilia Fire Thunder is running to be the first woman Pine Ridge Tribal Council chief.

A former healthcare lobbyist and clinic organizer in Southern California, she’s also working hard for Daschle.

In 1987, she returned to the reservation and her Oglala Lakota roots: “My language is my identity,” said Fire Thunder, whose Lakota name translates to “Positive-thinking Woman.”

Once home, she encouraged women to stand up to abusive husbands and boyfriends and took part in a campaign to get tribal leaders to stop drinking.

During tribal elections, Fire Thunder went to candidate’s speeches: “I’d raise my hand and ask, ‘Are you sober?’ When they stumbled for an answer, I’d say, “Thank you. You answered my question.’ ”

Now she faces her biggest project yet: convincing her people to express their voices in nontribal elections. “We may be poor,” she said. “We may not have a job. But we’ve got a vote and we want people to pay attention to us.”

Recently, Fire Thunder took a visitor to a spot just outside Wounded Knee, near a burial site considered sacred ground to the Oglala Lakota: the place where about 300 Indians -- including women and children -- were gunned down by the Army’s Seventh Cavalry on Dec. 29, 1890.

To this day, the image of their ancestors lying dead in the snow of a brutal South Dakota winter still angers many Native Americans. Fire Thunder hopes it will become another motivation to move them toward the polls.

“We vote not only for the present and future but for the past,” she said, gesturing toward a cloud-filled prairie sky. “As Indians, everything we do, we do for our ancestors. The images of those who came before us, they’re everywhere.”