Native American tribes dependent on fossil fuel resources rip Biden admin for double standard

Native American tribes that rely on fossil fuel production across the nation reiterated their demand that the Biden administration allow them to develop the resources on their lands.

Tribal leaders and energy experts contacted by Fox News Digital criticized efforts to restrict oil, gas and coal production even as those resources sustain thousands of Native Americans's way of life.

The Department of the Interior has repeatedly expressed support for boosting tribal sovereignty for Indigenous tribes, but has also pursued a climate agenda limiting fossil fuel production on federal lands and waters.

I believe in the right that all property owners have to develop what belongs to them in any way that they want," Daniel Cardenas, the chairman of the National Tribal Energy Association and a member of the Pit River Tribe, told Fox News Digital in an interview. .

Roughly 20% of the nation's total oil and natural gas reserves, 30% of domestic coal reserves west of the Mississippi River and additional natural minerals — altogether worth about $1.5 trillion — are on Native American lands, according to a 2014 study from think tank Property and Environment Research Center (PERC). .

"Resource tribes depend on the development of their resources to create better tomorrows for our children," Conrad Stewart, the director of energy and water for the Crow Nation of Montana, told Fox News Digital in an interview.

In addition, the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara (MHA) Nation, Osage Nation, Southern Ute Tribe and Navajo Nation are among several tribes nationwide that actively rely on oil and gas revenues to meet their budgets. .

Land belonging to the MHA Nation — which is known also as the Three Affiliated Tribes — sits atop the Bakken Formation in North Dakota, a massive deposit of oil and natural gas resources.

MHA Nation Chairman Mark Fox said in June 2021 that it was his tribe's right to develop energy resources "so our children and grandchildren for the next 100 years have somewhere to live.".

"The MHA nation has benefited tremendously from the oil and gas activity on reservation, primarily with employment," Ron Ness, the president of the North Dakota Petroleum Council, told Fox News Digital in an interview.

"The current administration has worked to support the Navajo Nation on most clean energy initiatives," McClure told Fox News Digital.

DOI spokesperson Melissa Schwartz, though, told Fox News Digital that the administration supports Native tribes in the "exercise of their sovereign powers" to manage their lands.

"Tribes should have the ability to determine whether, when and how to develop energy resources on their lands," DOI Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Bryan Newland said during his confirmation hearing last year

Still, experts said the Biden administration could do more to incentivize energy production and increase compensation for resources on tribal lands

"Overall, oil and gas, like casinos, is important where those revenue sources can be tapped," said Terry Anderson, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution who authored the 2014 PERC report laying out energy resources on Indigenous lands

Since the early 1800s, the federal government has made itself the trustee of lands and natural resources on Indian reservations, according to the Native American Rights Fund

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Because the federal process for approving every lease and agreement on Native American lands is notoriously slow, energy companies have actively tried to avoid projects on such properties, according to Regan

Cardenas, from the National Tribal Energy Association and who supports all energy production on native lands, said the Biden administration has failed to explain to tribes how traditional energy jobs would be replaced by promised clean energy jobs