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Thursday April 8, 2004
DOI request to dismiss Cobell case comes under fire
“Does not pass the laugh test” by Sam Lewin Native Times A request from Interior Secretary Gale Norton to dismiss the Indian trust lawsuit is drawing criticism.
In a letter to Colorado Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell, Norton outlines the progress Interior has made in providing an accounting of trust monies owed to thousands of Indian account holders and beefing up computer security.
“ The Department has aggressively addressed concerns regarding the potential risk of unauthorized access to Individual Indian trust data from the Internet. During the past three fiscal years, we have committed more than $80 million to improving security over our information technology systems with a particular emphasis on preventing unauthorized access from the Internet. We have installed sophisticated technologies, developed and adopted perimeter security standards, conducted monthly scanning to identify and mitigate potential system vulnerabilities, and trained tens of thousands of employees in system security responsibilities,” Norton’s letter states.
The correspondence concludes with a request to dismiss the case.
“ Because the Government is no longer delaying in the performance of its accounting duties, we are asserting in the court of appeals that the jurisdiction of the court in Cobell has now ended. Our brief presents arguments, based on the Administrative Procedures Act and separation of powers, that the court has no further role to play unless and until a proper challenge is brought once the accountings are complete,” Norton writes.
South Dakota Senator Tom Daschle issued a statement opposed to Norton’s request.
“The submission yesterday of the Interior Department’s brief in support of its motion to dismiss the Cobell case is the latest in a series of unprecedented maneuvers by the Department to avoid accountability for years of mismanagement of Indian trust assets. The Department’s suggestion that it has the Indian trust management problem in hand, thereby rendering the Cobell lawsuit moot, does not pass the laugh test. The truth is that the Indian trust fund has been so grossly mismanaged for so long – by Administrations of both parties – that no one today has any idea how much should even be in the account, let alone who is owed what, leading U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth to label the government’s actions in the Cobell case ‘fiscal and governmental irresponsibility in its purest form,” Daschle said. “President Bush should direct the Interior Department to cease its obsession with derailing the Cobell case and get on with the job of crafting a consensus solution to the problem. If the Administration wants to end the litigation, it should do so by making a just settlement of the Cobell case a top priority, not by interfering with the constitutional right of Indian trust account holders to seek a fair hearing in a court of law.”
Officials with the Department of Interior and the Bureau of Indian Affairs did not return a call seeking comment
In the past few days, two veterans jurists were picked to mediate the case, and court-appointed Special Master Alan Balaran, blaming political pressure from DOI, said he would resign from the case.
