Kristi Noem, the two-term Republican governor of South Dakota is one of Donald Trump’s staunchest allies and has sought to burnish her national credibility with a hard-line stance on illegal immigration and border security. And she is now the president-elect’s pick to head the Department of Homeland Security, the massive, $100 billion federal agency that oversees the border, disaster response and federal protection. In her own state, however, she is banned from setting foot on tribal lands, the Washington Post reports. The nine nations whose reservations cover about 12 percent of South Dakota blocked Noem last year because of her allegations that cartels operate there and that tribal leaders are somehow complicit — all of which those leaders deny.
What they see as Noem’s penchant for exaggeration and disrespect for Native Americans could presage trouble in her coming federal role, they say. Both are likely to be raised when her confirmation hearing begins Friday, as are charges she prioritized border security over storm victims in her state. Wayne Ducheneaux, a former tribal council representative for the Cheyenne River Sioux, calls the ban “a very telling action … that at the core goes to Governor Noem’s disregard for tribal sovereignty and a lack of understanding about how borders work. She lacks a fundamental understanding about how to work across any type of border, be it the United States border with Mexico or the Native nations within her own state.”
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