Senate Panel Looks Into Indian Tribes’ Donations

Finally, after decades of fighting for the return of tribal lands taken by the U.S. government more than a century ago, the Cheyenne-Arapaho Indians believed that things were about to change. Past treaties had not done it. Legislation had not done it. But on this day, they were lunching with the president.

After so many losing fights, the Oklahoma tribe finally had figured out the ways of Washington, or so they thought. They pledged $100,000 to the Democratic National Committee, more than they had in their bank account at the time. Suddenly, on June 17, 1996, tribal leaders were breaking bread at the White House with none other than President Clinton.

“It’s politics, . . . the white man’s world and all of that,” Chairman Charles Surveyor explained to his fellow tribe members beforehand, a frank conversation that was recorded on audiotape and may soon be played at the Senate’s campaign fund-raising hearings. Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt is among those expected to testify at the hearings today on allegations that contributions from Native American tribes have influenced government policy.

“If you want to get things done you’re going to have to play things their way . . ,” Surveyor continued. “It may not seem right . . . but if you want some things done for your tribe or something, you’ve got to go along. You’ve got to play ball the way they play it or they’ll leave you out.”

Scores of tribes have caught on to the white man’s way, making Indian tribes--both the casino-rich and the struggling--a hot new prospect for fund-raisers in both parties. A computer analysis of Native American giving prepared for The Times shows that donations to both parties have risen tenfold from 1991 to 1996, with the bulk of the money going to the Democrats.

The DNC created an Indian outreach position last spring, a job now held by Gwen Carr, a member of the Cayuga Nation. The Republican National Committee said it is pursuing tribal money by touting Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-Colo.), the lone Native American in the Senate and a recent defector from the Democrats.

Money Has Opened Doors in Washington

The flow of funds--$1.5 million to Democrats in the 1996 election cycle alone--has given tribal leaders new entree in Washington. But it also has raised questions about exploitation and influence peddling that the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee intends to delve into at its hearings.

The government still has not returned the Cheyenne-Arapaho’s 7,000 acres. And because tribal leaders later complained that they were led to believe that the donation would lead to the land return, the Democrats in March sent back $107,671.74 to the tribe.

No refund was necessary, however, in the case of the St. Croix Chippewa, the Oneida of Wisconsin and the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux of Minnesota. Together, they contributed more than $270,000 to Democrats--and they got what they wanted.

These tribes operated their own casinos. So in 1993, when three nearby bands of Wisconsin Chippewa sought to convert an off-reservation dog track in Hudson, Wis., near the Minnesota border, into a full-blown casino, the tribes that already had casinos objected vociferously.

Their situation looked grim in November 1994, when the regional office of the Bureau of Indian Affairs recommended approval of the Chippewa casino. The case then went to Washington, where a mid-level staff member in the Interior Department also endorsed the casino.

But the opposing tribes were as busy as the bureaucrats. They hired lobbyist Patrick J. O’Connor, a plugged-in former treasurer of the DNC. O’Connor went right to the top, button-holing Clinton at an April 1995 appearance at a community college in Minneapolis. Clinton told presidential advisor Bruce Lindsey to talk to O’Connor, who was angry that the White House Indian expert, Loretta Avent, had not returned his calls.

Lindsey called Avent from Air Force One, but she continued to resist. And in a memo Avent wrote later, she said she was glad she did not get involved in the intra-tribal dispute. “My instinct on this was right (STAY OUT OF THIS. WHOEVER THE PRESSURE COMES FROM COULDN’T BE WORTH OUR GETTING INVOLVED. I DIDN’T. THANK GOD!),” she wrote to Harold M. Ickes, then deputy White House chief of staff.

White House Denies Applying Pressure

Ickes, however, had gotten involved--although the degree remains in dispute. After O’Connor contacted Ickes, the White House’s political point man, his aides called Interior Department officials three times to check on the status of Babbitt’s decision, according to records.

White House officials said the inquiries were not designed to pressure the Interior Department to act one way or the other. But the White House learned well ahead of others that the department was prepared to reject the casino.

Meanwhile, O’Connor was also working his Democratic contacts. He met with former Democratic Party Chairman Donald L. Fowler, who said in his testimony before the Senate committee last month that he recalls calling “someone at Interior” on the case.

Normally, Ada Deer, the director of Indian Affairs, would have ruled on the matter. But Deer, a Menominee Indian from Wisconsin, withdrew from the issue because she had made a small political contribution to the leader of one of the tribes advocating the casino.

Ultimately, the Interior Department rejected the Chippewa casino plan. While Babbitt insists that the decision was made strictly on its merits, there have been curious contradictions in his accounts.

On July 14, 1995, Babbitt met in his office with Paul Eckstein, a former college classmate, law partner and old friend who had been hired by the Chippewa tribes. Eckstein said Babbitt told him he had been pressed by Ickes to make a decision on the casino that day.

Last year, Babbitt denied Eckstein’s account, saying that he and Ickes never discussed the matter. While he acknowledged earlier this month that he did tell Eckstein he had been pressured by Ickes, he said it was not true. Rather, the remark was just an excuse to cut the meeting short, he said.

“I do believe that Mr. Eckstein’s recollection that I said something to the effect that Mr. Ickes wanted a decision is correct,” Babbitt wrote in a revised account. “Mr. Eckstein was extremely persistent in our meeting and I used this phrase simply as a means of terminating the discussion and getting him out the door.”

Eckstein has also testified that Babbitt told him the tribes opposing the casino had donated heavily to the Democrats. A Babbitt spokesman said the secretary will answer that charge during his testimony before the Senate panel.

Hearings Put Old Friends at Odds

Babbitt will be joined at the witness table by Eckstein, a situation that pits the two old friends against each other in a dispute with significant consequences.

The Justice Department recently opened an inquiry into the circumstances surrounding Babbitt’s rejection of the casino application.

In an ongoing civil lawsuit filed by the tribes who lost the dispute, a federal judge ruled “there is a distinct possibility that improper political influence affected” the casino decision.

Native American advocates see a mixed blessing in tribes’ recent plunge into the world of campaign financing.

“I find it very corrupting that tribes are being asked to contribute,” said Lester Brown, a Cherokee who is director of American Indian studies at Cal State Long Beach. “But I find it very clever that tribes are playing the games everyone else is playing.”

In the 1992 election cycle, Native American tribes and groups donated $121,260 to the Democrats and $15,071 to the Republicans, according to a review by the independent Campaign Study Group.

By the time Clinton ran for reelection, donating tribes ranged from the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians in Indio, Calif.,to the Mashantucket Pequots of Connecticut. Democrats took in $1.5 million in American Indian money, according to the review, while Republicans tapped into $205,650.

Some of the campaign dollars came from the Cheyenne-Arapahos, who said they would contribute again if they thought it would result in the return of their land.

Their recent dealings with some of the Democrats’ top fund-raisers--including Terence McAuliffe, the Clinton-Gore finance chairman, and Nathan Landow and Peter Knight, close associates of Vice President Al Gore--have made them far wiser in the ways of Washington.

When the tribe’s leaders returned home from their White House visit, Democratic officials quickly hit them up for their $100,000 pledge.

“It costs $100,000 to visit the president,” tribal official Tom Burns told his colleagues matter-of-factly in another taped conversation.

Times staff writer Glenn F. Bunting contributed to this story.