After Trump Directive, Feds Send Lumbee Back to Congress for Recognition

When President Donald Trump ordered the Department of the Interior in January to submit a report outlining ways for the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina to get full federal recognition, some lauded the move as historic and long overdue. 

The Interior Department’s report, however, was met with less fanfare. Its central message, as best we can discern from people who have seen it: Keep asking Congress. 

Elizabeth Peace, a spokesperson for the Interior, told The Assembly and the Border Belt Independent that the report was submitted to the White House on April 8. “We anticipate the tribe will work with Congress on a path forward to be formally recognized,” Peace said on July 28. 

But Peace would not provide the report, directing us to submit a Freedom of Information Act request. The department has not responded to that request.

The Lumbee have been asking Congress to act for decades. The largest Native American tribe east of the Mississippi River with 55,000 members, the Lumbee have had state recognition since 1885. Congress granted the tribe partial federal recognition in 1956, acknowledging the tribe’s existence but denying it the financial benefits that fully recognized tribes receive.

“The Department of Interior, along with our congressional leadership, know that the legislative route is the only clear and concise way to amend the Lumbee Act of 1956,” Tribal Chairman John Lowery said in an email this week. Lowery said he consulted with the Interior three times and read a draft of the report.    

Tribes seeking recognition typically lobby Congress to pass legislation or apply through the Interior. Federal courts can also grant recognition, but the method is rarely used. Each option is time-consuming and expensive, as tribes must document their history to essentially prove they are Native American. 

Many of the 574 federally recognized tribes went through Congress; the most recent to gain status was the Little Shell Band of Chippewa Indians, in Montana, in 2019. 

Thom Tillis, a Republican U.S. senator from North Carolina and advocate for the Lumbee, has long said he prefers a legislative path for the tribe. So has Lowery.  

“It’s clear, concise, and unambiguous, and that’s what we need,” Lowery told The Assembly and The News & Observer in April. “We need clear, concise, and unambiguous action, which will leave no room for any type of lawsuits or potential threats of lawsuits or even for another president following him to come in and undo it.”

‘Casino Cartel’  

Lumbee recognition has bipartisan support in Washington, D.C. The U.S. House most recently passed the Lumbee Fairness Act in December 2024 with a vote of 311-96. Rep. David Rouzer, a Republican whose 7th congressional district includes Robeson County, introduced the legislation again in January. 

But the Senate version of the bill has continued to stall. Sponsor Tillis’ frustration reached a boiling point last November, leading him to try to block recognition of the Wounded Knee Massacre Memorial and Sacred Site, where U.S. troops slaughtered more than 250 Lakota Sioux people in 1890, to make a point about the Lumbee. Some Sioux leaders had opposed Lumbee recognition. 

Sen. Mike Rounds, a South Dakota Republican, urged his colleagues to pass the bill, calling the massacre “one of the darkest moments in our nation’s history.” 

“Although we can’t rewrite the past,” Rounds said, the bill was “one way to show healing and progress.” 

Tillis objected. 

“I want to make this very clear to the Oglala Sioux tribe and the Cheyenne River tribe: It’s not about you,” he said. “I’ve got an issue with Sioux’s leadership going after the Lumbee tribe in eastern North Carolina.” 

Tillis, who did not respond to a request for comment for this story, said he believed the South Dakota site was sacred and federal recognition of it should become law—”just not yet.” 

Tillis faced criticism for his pushback, including from leaders of Four Directions Native Vote, a voting rights organization led by Native Americans. OJ and Barb Semans, co-directors of the group and members of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, accused Tillis in an op-ed for Native News Online of using the Wounded Knee legislation as leverage for Lumbee recognition. “It was a horrible event,” they said, “to choose to make a point.” 

To Lumbee people, though, Tillis’s stance was another example of his dogged support for their interests—and his willingness to blast other tribes standing in their way. During the same speech in November, Tillis lashed out at what he called the “casino cartel” led by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. Tillis said the Eastern Band, which operates casinos in western North Carolina and is the state’s only tribe with full federal recognition, uses money and influence to sway lawmakers. 

With full federal recognition, the Lumbee tribe could also open a casino. 

Tillis said he stuck up for the Eastern Band during his four years as speaker of the N.C. House from 2011 to 2015. “My reward,” he said, “was to have them use some of the treasure that was gained from my support in the state House to pay lobbyists huge sums of money to discredit the application for recognition of the Lumbee Indians.” 

The Eastern Band and other critics of Lumbees’ quest have pointed to the tribe’s complex and diverse history. Lumbees descend from several Native American tribes, including the Cheraw, Saponi, and Tuscarora who fled European colonizers. They settled along the banks of the Lumber River, intermingling with other Native Americans as well as Black and white residents–which some have used as an argument against tribal recognition.  

Michell Hicks, principal chief of the Eastern Band, has said the tribe wants the Lumbee to seek full federal recognition through federal agencies rather than Congress. “It’s a complicated issue that needs proper evaluation,” Hicks told The News & Observer and The Assembly earlier this year. “We say that respectfully.”

The Lumbee tribe has said for years that it cannot seek recognition through bureaucratic channels because the 1956 Lumbee Act essentially ended the tribe’s relationship with the federal government. So it has relied on Congress instead, with more than 30 bills introduced since 1988. 

Tillis’ Retirement 

Soon, the tribe will have to navigate Congress without its loudest cheerleader. Tillis announced his retirement in late June, a day after clashing with Trump over the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Tillis said the domestic policy legislation would gut Medicaid and cost North Carolina billions of dollars. 

“Thom Tillis is making a BIG MISTAKE for America and the Wonderful People of North Carolina,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

Ted Budd, North Carolina’s other U.S. senator, also supports full federal recognition for the Lumbee. A spokesperson for Budd did not respond to a request for a comment for this story.  

But when Tillis leaves, the Lumbee tribe will undoubtedly turn to his successor for help. Two well-known candidates have said they will run, setting up what is expected to be one of the most expensive 2026 Senate races: Roy Cooper, a Democrat and former North Carolina governor, and Michael Whatley, chair of the Republican National Committee. 

Both men are familiar with the tribe. Cooper posed for a picture with Lowery in 2022 after they met in Raleigh to discuss economic development, missing and murdered Indigenous women, and the impact full federal recognition could have on the state, according to the tribe. 

The Republican National Committee opened an office in Pembroke, home to the Lumbee headquarters, in early 2022. Whatley was chairman of the North Carolina Republican Party at the time and said Republicans wanted to build on momentum in Robeson, where more voters had shifted their support toward GOP candidates. 

“We’re excited that this county went red in 2020, but we don’t want it to be a one-off election,” Whatley said during the office’s opening event. “We want this to be a Republican county going forward.”

Whatley’s wish came true. Republicans won most of the contested races in Robeson County in the 2022 midterm elections, including Budd’s. Trump won 63.39 percent of the county vote in 2024, up from 58.93 percent in 2020. 

‘Tireless Champion’ 

Lowery generally doesn’t speak publicly about politics. But his brother, Jarrod Lowery, is a Republican who has represented Robeson County in the state House since 2022. Jarrod Lowery has said the Democratic Party no longer aligns with the values of many voters in Robeson County, home to about 117,000 people. 

John Lowery told The Assembly and the Border Belt Independent he was confident Congress would grant full federal recognition, even without Tillis’s help. 

“Senator Tillis continues to be our champion in the U.S. Senate and his decision to retire will not hinder his efforts to push the Lumbee Fairness Act across the finish line,” John Lowery said in a statement. “He is a tireless champion for us and I know the leadership of the Eastern Band of Cherokee are happy he is leaving, but I can guarantee that he will not stop working to get our bill passed.” 

Support for the Lumbee tribe united Tillis and Trump, although their relationship was volatile at best. Trump visited Robeson County ahead of the 2020 election and vowed on the campaign trail last fall to support full federal recognition for the Lumbee. (So did Democratic candidate Kamala Harris.) 

Tillis touted Trump’s directive to the Interior in January. 

“In September 2024, President Trump made a promise to the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina to right the historical wrongs of the Indian Termination Era,” Tillis said at the time. “I remain committed to working with President Trump and the North Carolina Congressional Delegation in a bipartisan, bicameral manner to pass the Lumbee Fairness Act to ensure the Lumbee Tribe’s federal recognition is secure and free from legal obstacles.”

Unless something changes soon, Tillis might leave Washington without seeing them get that recognition.