Elouise Cobell, Judge Lamberth are targets of a “disrepectful” BIA parody
The Denver Post
By: Bill McAllister
MediaNews Washington Bureau Chief
September 12, 2000
WASHINGTON — The leader of a major lawsuit by Native Americans against the government says top officials at the Bureau of Indian Affairs ridiculed her at a recent agency party.
Elouise Cobell, a member of the Blackfeet tribe, has been widely praised by Native Americans for spearheading the lawsuit over the government’s mishandling of thousands of Indian trust accounts.
But Cobell told The Denver Post that top aides to BIA Director Kevin Gover, the Clinton administration’s top Native American appointee, made fun of her at a recent farewell party for agency spokesman Rex Hackler. At that party, some of the BIA’s top staffers sang a version of “”Thanks for the Memories” that portrayed her as “”contemptible Cobell.”
“”When I read it, I just got angry. It’s so disrespectful,” Cobell said in an interview from the Blackfeet Reservation in Montana where she runs a bank. Cobell noted that the song was written by two of Gover’s top aides, Michael J. Anderson, a deputy assistant Interior secretary, and Loretta Tuell, a special assistant to Gover.
Anderson confirmed that he and Tuell had drafted the song, but said it was a parody and “”not meant to be taken seriously.”
“”It was meant to be humorous. It was not meant to be mean,” Anderson said. “”I’m sorry to hear that she was offended.”
Cobell said she believed the tone of the song was significant in view of Gover’s tearful public apology Friday to Native Americans for the way the BIA has treated them in the past. Gover’s statement was praised by the White House’s top aide on Native American issues, but condemned by many Native American leaders as offering too little, too late.
“”It was a tactic to make everybody in Indian Country feel sorry for him,” said Cobell, one of the strongest critics of the speech. “”I don’t think he has acted in good faith,” she said of Gover, a Pawnee tribal member and a lawyer from New Mexico. One day he allows aides to sing a song that criticized her “”and the next day he was crying around. I can’t put the two and two together,” she said.
Cobell’s suit has been one of the major issues of Gover’s tenure as assistant Interior secretary for Indian affairs.
In the song, Hackler, who left the government to work in public relations, is called “”Roy Heckler.” The play on Heckler’s name was part of the parody, Anderson said.
Last year, U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth held Gover and two Cabinet secretaries in contempt for their handling of the case.
“”Thanks for the memories of Contemptible Cobell/Gover Almost Fell/Roy Heckler spins/Department wins/We’re out of Royce’s Hell/Roy Heckler you’re great,” the song went.
The government is appealing Lamberth’s decision to keep the trust account case under his review for five years. The BIA has been unable to account for billions of dollars that it has held in trust for more than 300,000 Native Americans in what the judge has called one of the worst government abuses he has ever seen.
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