Thank You For Smoking, Part Tali: Follow the Money

We got some feedback about our blog regarding the mysterious smoke shop subsidy, which puts money in the pockets of people who sell cancer sticks in our communities.  Seems pretty stupid, but it passed the Tribal Council unanimously, and Baker’s treasurer was there to support it.  So someone said we should follow the money.  As in, whose pockets does that $725,000 land in?  And lo and behold, the mystery became much clearer.

First, remember that the money helps two classes of people:  1) the people who lease their land to smoke shop owners, who now have most of their rent guaranteed, and 2) the smoke shop owners themselves, who now don’t actually have to pay their own rent. 

So a closer look shows that one of the proponents of giving Cherokee money to cancer peddlers instead of senior citizens was Chuck Hoskin, Jr.  And it turns out that his dad, Chuck Hoskin, Sr. owns land that is leased to a smoke shop.  Cha-ching!  What a great deal!  Chuck Jr. didn’t even recuse himself, he just voted to have the Cherokee Nation send money to his dad.  Pretty sweet.  It must be tough for Chuck Sr., making ends meet.  He’s already having to work two full-time jobs (State Rep and Chief of Staff).  The Nation was only paying Chuck Senior $130,000 this year, and the State of Oklahoma was chipping in a mere $38,400. 

While that’s not bad for a guy who lives in Vinita but whose offices at both of these “full-time” jobs are in Tahlequah and OKC, he did manage to find a way to squeeze another few extra bucks out of the Nation.  Well played.

Who else?  Well, who else is close to Baker?  No one is closer, literally, to Baker than the guy whose job is to drive him around.  Billy Bob Dougherty was a campaign donor Baker hired to be his driver/special projects guy.

But guess what?  Dougherty also owns a smoke shop and apparently needs a second check from the Cherokee Nation. Thanks to his boss/co-pilot, he doesn’t have to pay rent at his store anymore, according to the Cherokee Phoenix. 

So, he can continue selling low-tax tobacco, because of course it is in the Nation’s best interest to do so.  And the idea of giving the Cherokee people’s money away to people who sell tobacco, instead of say, that elder stipend we’ve be waiting by the mailbox for, is not just a stupid idea.  It’s starting to look like a corrupt one.

Thanks For Smoking

Last month, the Cherokee Nation Tribal Council voted unanimously to pass a law that subsidizes the sale of tobacco.  So, the Nation is now in the position of buying billboards that say “Tobacco Stops With Me,” while at the same time paying people to sell you tobacco at below-market prices.

Here’s the deal: The Cherokee Nation is going to take $725,000 of the Cherokee people’s money and give it to the people who own the land that the smoke shops sit on.  Which means that the people who run the smokeshops don’t actually have to pay their rent anymore, the Cherokee Nation is picking up the tab.

Which is actually good news, because if the Cherokee Nation has close to a million bucks to subsidize the people who sell us cancer sticks, we’re sure that means they’ve already fully-funded health care and college scholarships, and of course, eyeglasses and dentures.   

We’re glad there are no longer any social problems that need to be addressed in the Cherokee Nation, and we anxiously await the roll-out of subsidies for folks at liquor stores and perhaps the fine folks at Hostess because the price of Ding-Dongs is getting just a little too high for our diabetes-riddled communities.

Background Checks Are For the Little People

If you want to go to work for the Cherokee Nation or one of its businesses, you have to pass a background check.  Unless you want to actually RUN the Cherokee Nation Businesses, in which case the Tribal Council doesn’t care whether you can pass one or not.  They only care if you can run funeral home, in which case you are qualified to run a $600 million a year business.

Last week, Jay Hannah, the executive vice-president of a bank with $5 billion in assets, was replaced as Chairman of CNB by Sam Hart, a mortician.  

This all happened because the council changed a law last week that Baker’s newly appointed board members did NOT have to get security clearance.

These guys get background checks; Bakers guys don't

This means that the council thinks that having someone who fails a background check can't clean the carpets at Housing Authority offices, but someone who can't pass a background check running our casinos is just okie-dokie.  It's the little guys that they are worried about, us common citizens, not Baker's hand picked guys at the top. The Tribal Council decided that doing business with the federal government in the defense industry (only a trillion dollar chunk of change, according to the fine folks at Wikipedia) was not worth pursuing if it meant they had to wait any longer to get rid of a Cherokee who knows how to run a multi-billion dollar business with a guy who knows how to run a small town funeral home. 

Frankie Goes to Tahlequah

Cherokees just keep on voting, and they keep on electing folks from Adair County.  According to the Cherokee Nation’s web site, Stilwell’s Frankie Hargis (an internet enigma) won the runoff. 

According to the Native American Times, Hargis will be serving the rest of Crittenden’s term, which gives her until August 14, 2013. 

We don’t know a whole lot about Frankie besides she’s female and likes to hug Joe Crittenden in victory celebrations.  

We’ve heard from reliable sources that she’s a good friend of Jodi F. Hawk and worked for the Cherokee Nation until she decided to run for council.  Tell us more about what you know, as the Cherokee Nation welcomes its newest council person. 

District 2 Pseudoresults

We're impatient.  We don't usually deal in rumors and speculation, but there haven't been any media reports yet on who won/lost or is in a runoff.  So we're just going to pass on what we've heard hopefully be able to confirm it pretty soon. 

What we've heard is that Joe Adair and Frankie Hargis are going to be in a runoff, which will be December 3.  

We don't have a whole lot more information than that at this point.  

There's good news and bad news on this: If you google Joe or Frankie, you'll find Cherokee Truth right there at the top of information about them.  That means people are paying attention to us.  The bad news is, there's not a lot out there on the interwebs for folks to learn about them. 

We've got a few weeks to learn more, and then one of them will be taking Joe Crittenden's place on the Tribal Council.

Frankie Hargis hugging S. Joe Crittenden-- Photo Courtesy Cherokee Phoenix

Election Limbo Part II, Day 11: Know your Roll/Role

It is important to know your roll* as a council member.

Ever since the Cherokee Nation won its lawsuit against the freedmen (last week), there has been some discussion about the OTHER lawsuit with the freedmen, known by some as the Nash case.  Nash is the name of the one of the freedmen who sued the Cherokee Nation in Tribal court (and lost) over citizenship.  The Cherokee Nation sued him (and a bunch of others) back in federal court.

Baker and his lawyer, Chuck Hoskin Jr., are referring to this when they said that Smith “secretly cut a deal secretly cutting a deal with Congressmen in DC to allow the Freedmen to remain on the roles (sic)* as long as he was chief in exchange for HUD money.  Smith illegally cut this deal with a group of Congressmen without the knowledge or consent of the elected Cherokee Council.”

He also said that the  "Tulsa World further verified that Smith waived the Tribes (sic) sovereignty and we demand the details. The tribe's suit, which waived the Cherokee Nation's sovereign immunity only, in that case, was originally filed in Tulsa,’ the Tulsa World wrote.”

They asked Attorney General Diane “Hammonds”   to investigate this “secret deal.”

Well she did, and she released the results of her investigation today.  The Smith campaign liked it so much, they posted it online.

 

It’s just a couple of pages long, and it’s pretty straight forward.  She notes that the request for the investigation was filed 3 days before the election and immediately publicized by Baker’s campaign.  She also points out that Baker was well informed about the Nash case, despite his claims otherwise.

We did a little research of our own, based on Hammon’s analysis, and the more we looked the more Cherokee Truth came out. Here’s what we discovered:

On February 3, 2009, the Cherokee Nation issued a news release, which is still publicly available on the Cherokee Nation’s web site for all to see. It begins:

“TULSA, Okla.—The Cherokee Nation filed today a lawsuit asking a federal court in Oklahoma to resolve the long-standing dispute of whether non-Indian Freedmen descendants have a federal right to citizenship in the Cherokee Nation.  The Cherokee Nation is asking the court to confirm that Congress unilaterally modified the Treaty of 1866, and, as a result, the non-Indian descendants of those Freedmen have no federal rights to citizenship in the Cherokee Nation.”

It later has a quote from Smith:

“Last year, I assured members of Congress, including Barney Frank (D-MA), that if they would let the federal courts decide we would push to have the controversy heard on the merits,” Smith said.  “This filing today is the Cherokee Nation keeping its word, and letting the federal courts have a clear path to reaching a decision on the merits without compromising the Nation’s sovereign immunity, and without the risk of setting procedural precedents that may affect other tribes.  Members of Congress have said they will respect a federal court decision on this issue, and this is the quickest way to an impartial, apolitical, judicial solution."

Nothing secret going on here: There was and is a news release about it on the Cherokee Nation’s web

site.

There are also later media references to the case, including an Associated Press story. 

Just two days after the case was filed, Hammons told a council committee meeting about it (see the rules committee meeting minutes from February 5, 2009).  Smith talked to the full tribal council about it at the February Council meeting (see the council meeting minutes from February 17, 2009).  The full council voted on, and unanimously approved of the lawsuit in the March council meeting (see minutes of the March 16, 2009 council meeting).  

Unanimously, of course, means everyone on the council agreed.  Bill John Baker and Chuck Hoskin Jr. were both on the council during these meetings, and both men were in attendance.  Hammons was kind enough to pass along a PDF showing Baker and Hoskin had indeed approved it.

So not only is the "deal" not secret, Baker and the full tribal council were explicitly informed about the case--so much so that they agreed it was a good idea for it to move forward!

So, that said, let’s walk back through Baker’s quotes again after having done some cursory research that any Cherokee citizen could do for themselves.

Baker claims: “Smith illegally cut this deal with a group of Congressmen without the knowledge or consent of the elected Cherokee Council.”  WRONG. Council minutes referenced above show that the council, and any Cherokee who checked the Cherokee Nation web site, were proactively informed about the lawsuit.

Baker claims: “Tulsa World further verified that Smith waived the Tribes (sic) sovereignty and we demand the details.”  WRONG AGAIN.  And while we’re handing out demands, how about this: the Cherokee people demand you pay attention in the council meetings we pay you to attend!  The details you need are in the minutes from the meeting in 2009 when you voted IN FAVOR of the lawsuit you are now criticizing.

Smith had some choice words on the subject and he, rightfully, lets Baker have it with both barrels.  You can visit his facebook page if you want to find out more.  

Baker and Hoskin may have presented more evidence to Hammons, but the evidence that any Cherokee can find is clear:  the discussion of the Nash case was made in a very public way and approved by the very people who now claim not to know anything about it.  It doesn’t seem like they take their rolls** as council members very seriously if they don’t even know what they voted on.

  

*Probably a typo.  He probably meant tribal rolls, the list of Cherokee Nation citizens, not ‘tribal roles’

** We meant to use the wrong word here.  Because it is funny.  We know our role, as citizens on the Cherokee Nation’s rolls.  See?  It isn’t that hard really. But don't get us started on the difference between polls and poles.

Election Limbo Part II, Day 10: Accountability Watch, Part 1

Today’s post doesn’t have a lot to do with the election, but it does have a lot to do with why Cherokee Truth even exists in the first place.  

We are going to make it a point to call out elected officials when they vote for something that is bad for their constituents but good for their political career.  And some of that happened last week at the Rules Committee meeting.

Lost in some of the discussion about who gets to vote after election day, and where they get to vote and when (all of which was decided by the freedmen, APCSJC and the BIA--at least two of which favor Baker for Chief), is the fact that the tribal council had an opportunity to send a message to the election commission about the idea that LATE voting should only take place in Tahlequah.

Smith made a big deal out of Baker voting against having any voting locations anywhere but Tahlequah. But Smith probably gives Baker too much credit--- the vote was 7-7, so Baker didn’t singlehandedly kill the idea of voting in other places besides Tahlequah.  He had some help.  Which made us wonder:  who was it that voted against their own constituents having a convenient way to vote late?

To start, there are 15 members currently on the council (APCSJC seat has yet to be filled, and Meredith Frailey is Acting Deputy Chief, so two seats are currently empty).  David Thornton arrived late, and didn’t vote.  So the council members who voted in favor of allowing people to vote in their own district were:  Lee Keener, Buel Anglen and Cara Cowan Watts, from District 5, Don Garvin and Janelle Fullbright from District 3 and at large council members Julia Coates and Jack Baker.  Voting against it were Baker, Tina Glory Jordan and David Walkingstick, who are all in District 1. Their folks are already voting in Tahlequah, so they were actually voting in favor of keeping an advantage for their constituents.  

That’s not the case for the other four voters. Jodie Fishinghawk from Stilwell and Curtis Snell from Kansas basically told their neighbors that if they wanted to vote late, they needed to drive to Tahlequah.  Same with Chuck Hoskin, Jr. from Vinita and Dick Lay from Ocheleta.

Lay is new on the council, so this was really one of his first votes, and it was to tell his constituents that they don’t deserve to be able to vote in  their district-- only in Tahlequah.  Our google maps show its 101 miles one way from Ochelata to Tahlequah.  202 miles round trip.  If you get 25 mpg that’s 8 gallons of gas-- a whopping $25+ to cast a vote.

Chuck Hoskin lives 70 miles away in Vinita.  That’s 140 miles round trip to vote.

Granted, any vote in a committee meeting would not have been binding, but it could have sent the election commission a message.  Hoskin, Lay, Fishinghawk and Snell could have at least made a symbolic gesture to fight for their constituents right to vote in their district during the extended voting times.

What do all of these council members have in common?  They all support Baker, not Smith, in the election. Baker wants the voting only to happen in Tahlequah, and at least four council members made the conscious choice to do what Baker wants instead of what would be good for the people that elected them. How's that for representation?

Election Limbo Part II, Day 8: Faulty Reasoning

Our readers are having a spirited debate over whose ‘fault’ it is we are in the situation we are in, after Kennedy’s court ruling on Friday.

 

Using the facts at hand, let’s figure out if Smith is at fault, if Baker is at fault, or, quite frankly, if there is anything to be at fault for, when, as the Attorney General says, we got everything we asked for.  And if there is credit, to whom is that due?

Let’s start, say, in the disco era.  Back in the 70s, when Ross Swimmer was representing our Nation while wearing leisure suits (we’re guessing), there was some debate over whether freedmen could be citizens if they weren’t also Indians. There was a federal court case, called Nero v. Cherokee Nation, which the Cherokee Nation won.  In that case, the federal government basically said the Cherokee Nation can determine its own citizenship. 

So… freedmen were not citizens prior to 1995 (when Baker got on the council), nor were they citizens prior to 1999 (when Smith was elected).  So we have to look at what happened when they (Baker & Smith) were in office.

In 1999, Smith was elected without freedmen votes.  He beat Joe Byrd, and Smith’s running mate, the late Hastings Shade, beat Bill John Baker for Deputy Chief.  Again, no freedmen votes. Why? Because they weren't citizens.

In 2003, Smith was elected again, and Baker won a council seat after John Ketcher retired.  No freedmen voted.  But, losing candidates in that election complained that freedmen weren’t able to vote, and that eventually turned into the case Vann v. Salazar, that was dismissed Friday night. So let’s focus on that case.  

In 2003, the freedmen tried keep Smith from being recognized as Chief with their lawsuit.  He was recognized.  In 2007, they tried to stop the election from happening, but it went forward anyway.  By 2011, the freedmen hadn’t won anything in the Vann v. Salazar case, and there was no federal law or treaty saying the freedmen had citizenship rights in the Cherokee Nation, even though they’d been arguing that for 8 years.  So until last week’s settlement between S. John Crittenbaker, the Freedmen and the BIA, freedmen didn’t have any citizenship rights because of the federal government.

So, the fact that there is now a federal court order granting freedmen citizenship rights (which APCSJC has said he thinks is the right thing, no matter what the Cherokee Nation Constitution says--- or as the court order he agreed to said “notwithstanding any provision of tribal law to the contrary.”), is entirely due to the fact that Crittenden AGREED to it.

So how did freedmen get citizenship before last week?  Well, in 2006 the Cherokee Nation JAT (soon to be renamed the Supreme Court) ruled in Allen v. Cherokee Nation Tribal Council that anyone with an ancestor listed on the Dawes Rolls was now eligible for citizenship, whether the person on the Dawes Rolls was Indian or not.  So that’s when freedmen (and don’t forget the inter-married whites) got to be citizens.  And it wasn’t because of what a treaty said. It was because of what the Cherokee Nation Constitution and our Supreme Court said.  The Justices who decided that were: Stacy Leeds (appointed by Smith), Darrell Dowty (appointed by Byrd originally, reappointed by Smith) and Darell Matlock (appointed by Smith). 

So if you believe the judicial branch is an independent branch of government, this isn’t Baker’s fault or Smith’s fault.  If you don’t believe the judicial branch is an independent branch of government, then brush up on your Cherokee Nation Constitution and do something about that.

In 2007, the Cherokee people passed a Constitutional amendment, going back to the old way.  Both Baker and Smith supported the people’s right to vote on the issue, but neither took a public stance, as far as we can tell, telling people which way they should vote.

In the meantime, Stacy Leeds quit the Supreme Court and decided she’d run for Chief instead.  So maybe some of the ‘blame’ for all this should go to her!

Since then, we’ve been in both tribal and federal court.

Smith has defended the Constitution, because, well, that’s what we elect a chief to do and that’s the oath he takes as Chief.  He stood up in both tribal and federal court for the Cherokee people’s right to amend their Constitution.  Until the last couple of weeks, we could say the same thing for Baker, but not Crittenden.

Crittenden voted against even letting the Cherokee people vote on this (see June 2006 Council Meeting Minutes) after the Freedmen were made citizens and has been one of the biggest freedmen supporters on the tribal council.  Again, that’s his right as an elected official, but when the Constitution was amended, he still took an oath to defend it, not sabotage it in federal court.  Baker is complicit, because he has pushed so hard to get freedmen votes into this election.

The fact that there is still a federal court case going (Cherokee Nation v. Nash) could be viewed as both Smith and Baker’s fault (again, if there really is a 'fault').  Remember, the tribal council has to approve any lawsuits, and that case was filed back in 2009 and no one has made a stink about it being a bad thing until now.  And to us, it seems like winning a lawsuit doesn’t weaken your case in a similar lawsuit, it only strengthens it, so we’re not sure how winning the DC case is bad news for the Cherokee Nation.  

The only time the Cherokee Nation lost anything in the DC case was when Crittenden willingly signed an order-- in full knowledge it violated Cherokee law--and made freedmen citizens anyway. And that, friends, is why we are still in Election mode, a week after the special election was supposed to end. 
 

34 Days until the New Election: It’s An Honor Just to Be Nominated

Tomorrow night, the tribal council is considering some nominations. (look for agenda link to pull it up)

The interesting items are the ones that were on a special council meeting which Baker and his friends skipped on purpose.

Sharon Wright is nominated as Marshal, Diane Hammons is nominated as Attorney General, and Susan Plumb is nominated as election commissioner.

Wright and Hammons were nominated by Smith, before his term expired and passed committee.  Acting Chief Joe Crittenden is in charge now, and voted against Wright in committee, but in favor of Hammons.  He won’t get a chance to vote on them in full council, but he’s said he thinks that the nominations should wait until the permanent chief is in office (either Smith or Baker).  The terms of these appointees are for five years, and are meant to overlap the terms of the chief.  The terms expired during the Smith administration, so he thinks he’s supposed to nominate them.  Crittenden thinks the new chief should nominate them. 

The council really are the ones who get to decide, and it’s hard to say how the votes will go.  Hammons passed unanimously in committee, so her nomination might go through, but Wright’s was tougher, and Baker voted against it.  Crittenden and Frailey are off the council and there are new folks on who didn’t vote in committee, so who knows how it will go.

Plumb passed unanimously, and is a council appointee, but we wonder if it will matter that the current council didn’t vote on her in committee.  Either way, she could have been on the commission the past three weeks, but hasn’t been because of the council members who skipped the meeting, including Baker.

Also, tomorrow night will be Joe Crittenden’s first shot at a state of the nation address to the council.  We’ll try to watch the live stream and see what happens.

Election Day 41: Playing Hookey

Ferris Bueller's  Bill John Baker's Day Off

The rumblings about Bill John Baker skipping out on today's council meeting were true. Today, Baker, S. Joe Crittenden and 4 other council members refused to show up to a meeting that would have addressed election law tweaks Baker himself actually demanded in court just a few short weeks ago. Not only that, but now the Election Commission has to work short-staffed for another 17 days because they weren't able to approve Susan Plumb, the woman unanimously appointed by the council, to be the 5th Election Commissioner. 

Chief Smith called Baker on the carpet saying, "Most Cherokees, if they flat out refuse to show up for work, they get fired. How does he expect anyone to believe he’ll do the work of a chief when he won’t do the work of a councilman?”

Speaker Meredith Frailey and the council members who showed up were dismayed that their colleagues would refuse to do the job with which they were entrusted by the Cherokee people, saying, "I’m very disappointed that we don’t have a quorum to do the work and be the voice of the Cherokee people."

Meanwhile, Baker and friends sent out a press release spewing that the special meeting requested by Speaker of the Council Meredith Frailey and called by Chief Smith was illegal and unconstitutional. They even went so far as to claim that council attorney Todd Hembree stated as much. 

However, in the very document supposedly backing up this claim, Mr. Hembree never even used those words. Perhaps they are counting on the fact that no one will read the opinion. But we did and we hope you will too. Go ahead, just click here.

In fact, according to Article 7, Section 7 of the Constitution, the Chief CAN call a meeting and SET the agenda. The council doesn't have to like it or apparently show up, but it is NOT illegal. In fact, it's very constitutional, so much so that it is actually written INTO THE CONSTITUTION. 

It's pretty weak and misleading for Baker and Company to stretch an attorney's memo about council procedure into something bigger and more important than the constitutional authority of the Chief. 

A little teaser for tomorrow's Truth--there's something that looks a little unusual about Baker's news release today. Do you see it?

Election Limbo Day 40: To Meet or Not to Meet?

Friday there is a special council meeting with four agenda items, two of which are focused on the election and two of which are not.

The two election-related items are the appointment of the council’s election commission nominee, Susan Plumb, and potential election law changes.  The council chose not to take up the changes in committee last week, even though the majority of the committee voted to do so.  They needed two thirds of the vote to amend the agenda, and came up one vote short.  Baker was one of the votes against considering changing the laws, and he tells the Muskogee Phoenix that changes to the election law ‘would not be valid at this point,’ even though he asked the Supreme Court to change the rules himself just a few weeks ago.

In fact, Baker proposed seven different election law changes himself to the Supreme Court, and could have had the council consider them at last weeks committee meeting, but instead voted not to.

It will be interesting to see what he does tomorrow, because, it’s apparent that a lot of Cherokees, including Smith and Baker, think things could be improved in our election processes.

Smith seems to think Baker might not show up at all, and points out that Baker once supported penalties for council members who skipped meetings back during the crisis.  In the Muskogee Phoenix story earlier this week, Smith challenged Baker to show up, and Baker didn’t appear to answer whether he would be there or not.

If he’s not, it may have something to do with the other two items on the agenda, the appointments of Diane Hammons as Attorney General and Sharon Wright as Marshal.  Both of these appointments are for 5 year terms, which are intended to overlap chief terms in accordance with the Cherokee Constitution.  Their terms have expired, but some council members, including Hoskin and Crittenden who are in Baker’s camp, wanted to wait until after the September election to fill those slots, just in case Baker wins and he can appoint them instead.  That’s just politics, but the other two items could impact the quality of our election-- so it will be interesting to see if Baker and his friends who have been critical of the previous election show up, or if they try to keep a quorum from being assembled.

Added to the mix is the fact that council member David Thornton is recovering from heart surgery and likely won’t be at the meeting.  It takes twelve members to make a quorum, so we’ll see if they get that many and see if they address the election issues that both candidates (and their supporters) have raised over the past few months.

Election Limbo Day 36- Deputy Chief/Chief

We’ve heard that S. Joe Crittenden will be sworn in on August 14 as Deputy Chief, and that at some point he’ll be acting chief.  Now we know that Crittenden will be in charge of the Nation until at least September 24th, depending on how fast the votes are counted and how long after that it takes to make things official, certified, etc.

So what’s the process for all this?  Does Crittenden take his Deputy Chief oath on August 14th, do a 180 and take the oath as Principal Chief?  Who is Deputy Chief then?  The Constitution says that it is the Speaker of the Council.  Right now, that’s Meredith Frailey, but we don’t know what that means a couple of weeks from now.  Is she still Speaker on August 14?  If so, is she automatically the Deputy Chief?  Or does the new council get a chance to elect (or re-elect) a new Speaker?  If so, when would they do that?  And who is Deputy Chief until then?  And does S. Joe get paid Principal Chief money for his short term as the big boss?

The council does have a special rules committee meeting scheduled for August 18, and a regular council meeting on August 22.  So they could address those things at that time. 

But until then, who knows what’s really going to happen?

Election Limbo Days 32 & 33- Tribal Council

How have we gone this long
without a Survivor reference?

We haven’t done much analysis of the council races, but things will be different after August 14.   Half the council seats (8) were up for election.  As far as incumbents go, one council member, Janelle Fullbright, did not draw an opponent and is back on the council for four more years.  One, Chris Soap, chose to run for Deputy Chief instead.  Tina Glory Jordan, Bradley Cobb, Cara Cowan-Watts, and Julia Coates each had opponents.  Cobb was the only incumbent who lost, in a new district.  Finally, one race pitted two council members against each other, Jodie Fishinghawk and Harley Buzzard.  Fishinghawk won that one.

Two new seats were created, and they were won by Lee Keener and David Walkingstick.

So the new council looks like this:

District One (Cherokee and Wagoner County):  Tina Glory Jordan, David Walkingstick and Bill John Baker (for a few more weeks or two more years).

District Two (Adair, Delaware and Ottawa County): Jodie Fishinghawk, Curtis Snell and an open seat that will be vacated by Joe Crittenden on August 14 when he is sworn in as the Deputy Chief

District Three (Muskogee, McIntosh, Sequoyah Counties): Don Garvin, Janelle Fullbright, David Thornton

District Four (Mayes, Craig, Nowata, Craig, Washington County): Dick Lay, Chuck Hoskin, Jr., Meredith Frailey.

District Five: (Tulsa and Washington Counties):  Buel Anglen, Cara Cowan-Watts, Lee Keener

At-Large:  Julia Coates and Jack Baker

The short version is that Cobb, Soap, Crittenden and Buzzard are going to be off the council, replaced by Lay, Keener, Walkingstick and whoever replaces Crittenden on the council.  Since Cobb, Soap and Buzzard were generally pretty friendly to Smith, he’s going to have a less friendly council to work with if he gets re-elected.  Baker, if he’s elected, will have more friends on the council than he does now.  Depending on how it shakes out in the council races, he might pick up a couple of more friends.

Since a chief has to work with the council to get his initiatives passed, these will be important things to think about moving ahead.

Election Limbo Day 29- Deputy Chief Elected

Photo Credit Cherokee Phoenix

Last night, the Cherokee people successfully elected a deputy chief, and on August 14th, S. Joe Crittenden will be sworn in along with all the other new council members. But, he will also begin acting as Principal Chief starting that day until a new Chief is successfully elected and then sworn in.

The final certified results showed Crittenden receiving 6478 votes (53.17%) to Soap's 5706 votes (46.83%). A little more than 12,000 folks voted, so voter turnout was lower to the tune of about 3000 votes.

Three council races were also decided--In District 1, David Walkingstick trounced Mark Vance garnering almost 70% of the vote.  In District 2, Jodie Fishinghawk beat Harley Buzzard by collecting 65% of the vote, and it was a close race in District 4 when Dick Lay beat incumbent Dr. Bradley Cobb. Only 80 votes separated the two.

Now that this is behind us-- we still have another election upcoming. We don't know yet when the new election will be held, but expect that announcement to come any day. But what can we expect?

You can expect we will be here, sorting thru the allegations and digging for the truth. Although, in this election, even when the truth is presented to people, some don't seem to care or believe it. 

If you've not read this blog since the beginning, and have some time to kill, we would encourage you to start at the beginning-- back to Monday, May 2nd, 54 days before the original election. In the last three months, there have been rumors, misinformation and exaggeration. And we've gotten to the bottom of most of it. 

13 Days Until the Election- How to Get Elected with Just One Vote

Could a person get elected to the Cherokee Nation Tribal Council with just one vote?’  Would it surprise you if the answer is yes?  The Cherokee Nation constitution says the seat of a council member whose seat is vacated by ‘removal, death, resignation or disability’ will be filled ‘by the candidate having the next highest number of votes in that district, who is available to serve and whose eligibility is confirmed by the Election Commission.  (see Article 6, section 13)

In 2007, 5 council members received at least 73% or more of the vote.  If any of them were to meet an untimely demise, someone who was rejected by 3 out of 4 voters would take a seat on the tribal council. 

In an extreme, case, you could look at the 2007 election of Meredith Frailey, who ran unopposed.  The way the Constitution is written, if she had an opponent, and that opponent went to the polls and voted for themselves and lost 615-1, then guess what?  That person would automatically become a tribal council member if anything happened to Frailey, regardless of that fact that they received only one vote.

On the June 25 ballot, Cherokees have a chance to change the law on this.  The proposed Constitutional amendment says that if there is a year or more left on the term,  and no general election is scheduled within 120 days, then a special election must be held within 90 days.  If there is one year or less, the council has to elect a replacement to fill the rest of the term.

If the Constitutional amendment fails, we could possibly see two new candidates sworn in. If Baker wins as Chief and resigns from the Council, Barbara Dawes Martens could take his seat for the next two years. She finished second in the last election for that seat, winning 36% of the vote. If Crittenden wins as Deputy Chief and resigns, Rita Bunch would be put on the council, since she finished second with 43% of the vote.  That is assuming those two candidates still live in those districts and are eligible.

We don’t know if Bunch or Martens would be good council members or not, but the truth is that voters did not elect them when they had a chance, so it seems a little odd to put them into office anyway, just because they finished second in a two person election.

A yes vote on the Constitutional Amendment is a vote in favor of  the change, and it keeps 2nd place candidates from automatically joining the tribal council.  A no vote means we keep things the same way.

Tomorrow:  Candidate guest blog!