State of Alaska backs Native corporations in COVID-19 dispute
Thursday, November 5, 2020
Indianz.Com
The state of Alaska is siding with Native corporations over tribal governments in a closely-watched COVID-19 case pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.
In a brief filed on Wednesday, the state admits that Alaska Native corporations
are not “sovereign entities”. And unlike Indian nations, the corporate entities lack a “government-to-government relationship” with the United States, the Alaska attorney general’s office acknowledges.
But the state argues that the shortcomings should be overlooked in order for the corporations to be treated as “Indian tribes.” That would allow them to shares of an $8 billion coronavirus relief fund that Congress established to help tribal, state and local governments get through the ongoing public health crisis.
“The state of Alaska has a strong interest in ensuring that all of its Alaska Native citizens receive the critical coronavirus relief funds that Congress intended for them,” the 26-page document reads.
With the brief, the state appears to be addressing a single sentence contained in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling in the case. According to the state, Alaska Native corporations (ANCs) provide services to Native citizens that the state cannot.
“State-run programs are already financially strained, and Alaska —- a state which derives much of its revenue from tourism and natural resource production and is thus already acutely impacted by the pandemic — is no different,” the brief reads. “Cutting off funding to the ANCs, which provide services to tens of thousands of Alaska Natives, will create a chasm that the state simply will be unable to fill — especially given the immediacy of the needs presented by the ongoing pandemic.”


D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals Decision
Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis Reservation v. Steven Mnuchin (September 25, 2020)
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