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Crow Creek Sioux chairman (a real warrior!) is ‘not going anywhere’
FORT THOMPSON, S.D. – On Dec. 15, Crow Creek Sioux Tribe Chairman Brandon Sazue got a visit from eight horseback riders on a pilgrimage to memorialize 38 Dakota men who died in the nation’s largest mass hanging, in December 1862 in Mankato, Minn.
“The group took a detour from the main ride to fill a pipe here that will be smoked and prayed over when they get to Mankato.”
The 35-year-old chairman was camped on 7,100 acres of wind-swept, snowy land owned by Crow Creek Tribal Farms. The IRS recently seized the tract and on Dec. 3 auctioned it off for $2 million less than its $4.6 million value to pay a purported tax bill for the tribe, a separate legal entity.
The riders found Sazue holding his own in sub-zero temperatures. The chairman took up residence on the expanse shortly after the auction, intending to fast and pray for its repatriation until the crisis is resolved. “I’m not going anywhere. This land never was and never will be for sale. Not yesterday, not today, not tomorrow. As chairman, I inherited the tax problem and tried to work with the IRS. They claim they ‘consulted’ with us, but all they did was tell us ‘here’s how it’s going to go.’” The IRS action appears to fly in the face of legal precedents as far back as a 1790 law prohibiting the transfer of Indian land without a treaty, according to a legal memorandum drawn up by the tribe’s attorneys, Mario Gonzalez, Oglala Lakota and Terry L. Pechota, Rosebud Sioux Tribe. The document was filed Dec. 2 in U.S. District Court in an effort to stop the sale. That request was denied; however, a trial will take place in March, during which the tribe will attempt to regain the site.
“It’s the Black Hills gold rush all over again,” said historian Waziyatawin, Ph.D., Wahpetowan Dakota from Upper Sioux and a University of Victoria research scholar. “Nowadays, the press is reporting on a green energy land rush and Department of the Interior efforts to free up millions of acres for wind and solar development. Open prairie land, such as that on Indian reservations in the Plains, is suitable for such enterprises. So the U.S. government is going after the poorest of the poor to find the resources it needs.” |
