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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Indian Voter Wants Candidates To Start Covering Tribal Issues Shoshone-Bannock Says Indians ‘Not That Big Of A Deal In Politics’

Associated Press

Garth Towersap is looking for candidates to support in the up-coming election. But nobody seems to be talking about the things important to him.

Most candidates aren’t talking about native sovereignty, treaty obligations, tribal gaming and cuts to the Indian Health Services budgets.

“Usually you never hear about them,” said Towersap, 32, a Shoshone-Bannock who lives at Fort Hall and runs a computer consulting business from his home.

“Reservation issues are big issues, but it’s a microcosm in terms of national issues. We’re just not that big of a deal in politics,” he said.

That may not be a surprise. According to U.S. Census Bureau statistics from 1994, Indians make up just 2 percent of the total population, and there are no good voting statistics available. U.S. voter registration is broken down into only three racial categories: Black, White, and non-White, Hispanic. All other races are lumped into one “other” category.

Congress gave Indians the right to vote in 1948, but in many cases, tribal members don’t expect to see their interests represented. History hasn’t given them much to bank on, because too many promises made by the federal government have been broken, Towersap said.

That makes it tough to find a candidate you can trust, he said.

“It’s like you go into the booth and hold your nose and pull the lever and then hope,” he said.

Actually, Indian issues are really no different than those important to non-Indians, Towersap said. A balanced federal budget, economic development and education funding all top the list of concerns for everyone, but there is some difference in perspective, he said.

Part of that difference lies in the fact that Indians see themselves first as members of their tribe. American citizenship is secondary, Towersap said. “Our perspective is colored by this word sovereignty and by the preservation of our culture,” he said.

The Indian perspective also is colored by the fact that tribes are funded largely with federal money, not through independent economic development.

But as the federal government turns more and more programs back to states, state and local elections are increasingly important, Towersap said.

“Now, we can’t afford to even let a school board election go by without voting, because they might make a decision about whether or not to bring buses to the reservation so our kids can get to school,” Towersap said.

Towersap said that locally, the Sho-Ban vote may lack punch in part because it is splintered between four southeastern Idaho counties. The reservation is spread out over Bannock, Bingham, Caribou and Power counties. There are registered voters in all but Caribou County.

But Pocatello Sen. Evan Frasure disagrees. In 1992, the Legislature moved district boundaries to consolidate minority votes throughout the state. All of Fort Hall was incorporated into District 35.

“There is no way in the world (the tribes) can say we’re not accommodating them,” said Frasure. “In Bannock County, we even split precincts to try to give them more voting power, but they are still less than 10 percent of the population in that district, so I don’t know how much influence they can have.”