I have included the comments from that article on here as well because they are an important part of this conversation.
Osage will hold runoff election for new chief
Jim Gray: The principal chief received only about 24 percent of the vote in Saturday’s primary and did not qualify for the July 19 runoff.
By CLIFTON ADCOCK World Staff Writer
Published: 6/9/2010 2:22 AM
Last Modified: 6/9/2010 5:29 PM
Correction
This story originally contained an incorrect date. The story has been corrected.
The Osage Nation will hold a runoff election for principal chief July 19, following the defeat of current Principal Chief Jim Gray on Monday.
The election comes at a critical time for the tribe, which could ask the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a case that might have put three of its Million Dollar Elm Casinos in jeopardy.
Gray, who received about 24 percent of the vote in Monday’s election, did not qualify for the runoff election but will hold office until the winner of the runoff is sworn in Aug. 4.
The candidates in the runoff are Assistant Principal Chief John Red Eagle, who received about 42 percent of the vote, and Tim Tallchief, who got about 29 percent.
Neither Tallchief nor Red Eagle could be reached for comment Tuesday.
Gray said his job is to prepare the winner of the runoff election for several issues facing the tribe, including a ruling in the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals this year stating that the Osage Reservation was dis-established in the early 1900s.
Three of the tribe’s casinos, including its largest one in Tulsa, sit on land that is not in trust with the federal government. Instead, the tribe had been operating under a National Indian Gaming Commission declaration that said the casinos are on the Osage Reservation and thus were legal Indian gaming facilities.
The effect
on the casinos was an unintended consequence of the 2001 lawsuit filed by the Osage Nation against the Oklahoma Tax Commission. In the lawsuit, the Osages argued that tribal members who lived in Osage County were exempt from paying state income taxes. The courts ruled that it was not a reservation, and because the casinos do not sit on trust land, their future is unclear.
National Indian Gaming Commission officials have said they will wait for the tribe to exhaust its legal options before deciding the casinos’ status.
An attempt to get the appeals court to rehear the case was rejected May 25, and the tribe was given 90 days to decide whether to appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, which usually only hears a handful of cases each session.
Gray said he plans to prepare a set of options in the case for the future principal chief to prepare them to move forward but did not state when the decision to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court would be made.
Gray took office in 2002, after the lawsuit was filed.
Gray said he is proud to have served as principal chief for the past eight years and that his proudest moment was seeing the tribe’s new constitution ratified in 2005, something he said his late father and others had worked hard to change the tribal government over the years.
“I appreciate the responsibilities of doing the job,” Gray said. “We went through so many changes these past eight years.”
Gray said the defeat was likely because of an anti-incumbent mood among voters, something he said he has survived twice in the past.
“The people have thrown out a lot of incumbents,” Gray said. “When the pendulum swings, it swings hard.”
The July 19 runoff will also feature two candidates for Assistant Principal Chief — Scott Bighorse and Amanda Proctor.
Candidates Geoffrey Standingbear, Raymond Redcorn, William “Kugee” Supernaw, Alice Goodfox, Daniel Boone and John Free were all elected to the Osage Nation tribal Congress. They will be sworn in July 7. The winners of the runoff elections will be sworn in Aug. 4.
Clifton Adcock 581-8462
[email protected]
By CLIFTON ADCOCK World Staff Writer
Reader Comments
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Some reader comments for this page were copied from “Osage chief defeated in tribal election,” which was published on 6/8/2010.
Comments
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forkandknife, San Francisco (1 day ago)
Is this a good or bad thing?
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Not in the Herd, Broken Arrow (1 day ago)
Yes this is a good thing.
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fumby, (1 day ago)
This is a good day!! forkandknife, this is a good thing. here are a couple of things jimmy has “accomplished” during his reign of mediocracy: he bought a mound of dirt in saint louis for $265,000.00 that no one ever sees and that has not been PROVEN to be any type of Osage artifact. He took and paid the way for (around) 20 people to go to france with him and the Nation paid thier way (you do the math). His sister was fired from the tribe so he created a position for her and paid her a healthy sum of money to do nothing. he looked the other way as a DIRECTOR of one of our tribal departments was thrown into the osage county jail for drinking and driving, then hired her boyfriend to work in her office and pay him a ridiculous salary and doing things that should not be mentioned in the (director) office. the kicker was that he had 8 years to place our casinos in trust and he did not do it, we now face the possibility that hundreds of Osages and non-osages will loose their jobs. only now can the tribe can move forward and clean up what jimmy has ruined.
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oky1, (1 day ago)
When the Osage 1st started dealing with our Whiteman’s government the Osage owned most of Missouri, Arkansas & large parts of Oklahoma & Kansas.
Along the way, over a couple hundred years, the Osage always tried to be cooperative with our Whiteman’s government & their promises.
Slowly over time on the Whiteman’s Road DC chiseled away at their promises to the Osage people until almost all of the Osage’s land was gone.
I forget, but somewhere around 1876 our DC Whiterman’s gov. was unable to get the Osage Tribal Chiefs to surrender up to DC the rest of the Osage’s surface lands so DC had those Chiefs removed from power & DC replaced them with local puppets that would comply with all of DC’s wishes.
We’ve all witnessed this DC type policy time & again, of installing puppet governments, in Iraq & in many other nations around the world
Sure enough a few years later those DC controlled Osage puppets surrendered most of the Osage tribal controlled surface lands around 1905.
As a mostly whiteman living next door to my Osage friends I have one suggestion for them.
When ever the Osage people make any more deals with our Whiteman’s gov. in DC have them carve their promises to your people upon the mountains on the Moon!
That way when they show back up in a few years to renege on their latest promises we can all witness DC in the dead of night trying to chisel away those promises off the face of the Moon!!
And as a far as the rest of us whities are concerned I guess DC will just keep on screwing us out of the promises they’ve made to us also. LOL;)
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fumby, (1 day ago)
Dang, oky1, you sound like an old Gary Cooper western.
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el Diablo, Hell (1 day ago)
Hopefully, whoever wins, Red Eagle or Tallchief, has a good business acumen and are saavy with the serious issues confronting the tribe.
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maggetsic1, sand springs (1 day ago)
I just hope who wins this run off will get the land the three casinos set on put in trust!!! I for one like my job and dont want to go some were else the tribe could loose a crap load of money if two of the three would close.
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fumby, (1 day ago)
el Diablo, i think whoever wins, Red Eagle or Tallchief, will deal with the issues handily. the issues are there becuase jimmy did nothing for the tribe. he can talk all day about how employment has grown but he himself may have single handedly destroyed the growth by not putting the casino land in trust. dont let him fool you, he has had eight years to place the land in trust. take care of your people and they in turn will take care of you. there was no anti-incumbent mood, jummy proved that in his administration, he came first and the people came second. anti-incumbent mood? how about the mound in st. louis for over $250,000, how about not putting hte land in trust therefore placing hundreds of employees at risk of losing there jobs, how about giving his sister a made up job after she was terminated for insubordination, how about jimmy’s lawsuits against his own congress, how about taking funding from our students to pay for his and 20+ others to go to france, how about Paying an out-of-state employee a large salary (substantially more than most Osages receive) PLUS expenses to travel here once each month to work, how about jimmy establishing a GAG Order prohibiting tribal employees from voicing any negative opinions againts any of his executive government activities, how about jimmy using $35,000 from Tribal Funds to pay for his personal travel. again, anti-incumbent mood? no, i think alot of ticked off voters tired of being ripped off by one of there own. Johnny red Eagle or Tim tallchief will get back to basics and take careof the Osage people. its that simple.
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shaw411, Scottsdale, AZ (1 day ago)
Congrats to my fellow Osages for recognizing we needed a change at the top!
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Sho-Dse-Moie, Pawhuska (1 day ago)
The elections were held on Monday, June 7. Polls were open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
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Sho-Dse-Moie, Pawhuska (1 day ago)
The elections were held on Monday, June 7, instead of “over the weekend”. Polls were open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
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The Cleaner, (23 hours ago)
Does this mean that all of the Gray nephews who are running casinos (and REALLY, REALLY, REALLY shouldn’t be) go away, too? Getting rid of them and hiring educated, knowledgeable staff to run the casinos would be a HUGE step in the right direction for the tribe!
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The Cleaner, (23 hours ago)
Why did it take 8 years to figure out this guy? Indian politics reek WAY worse than good ol’ American politics!
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roshambo, (22 hours ago)
I’m not Osage but to those that are critical of not putting the casinos in trust – wouldn’t that be contrary to the tribe’s position that it is a reservation therefore it’s not necessary?
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kyote, (22 hours ago)
1. Wouldn’t it just be easier to legalize gambling in Okiehoma? and no one would have to put land in trust (with the whiteman’s DC government). 2. if the election was monday why did it take the TW until wednesday to publish the story in their printed edition? Modern technology!!!!!!! I guess it is responsible for the continual degeneration of the printed edition in the last several years. The paper sometimes is in such poor condition that It times it is unreadable in parts. (light streaks of print, smears of different colors on pages almost daily, blurred color photos and some of these color ads and obits cost a lot of money and the print is horrible, trying to funnel every web site thru the TW web site why?, Those annoying stick on ads that deface my paper and I wouldn’t do business with any of these businesses.) I could go on and on but you all probably get the blurred picture.
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Marguerite, Ponca City (21 hours ago)
I was always amazed at the idea of Jim Gray being chief of anything, let alone a proud tribe like the Osage. Maybe now he’ll go back to selling newspaper ads.
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fumby, (20 hours ago)
roshambo – we are being critical because this was jimmy’s doing. he did not ask the members of our great tribe, he took the initiative becaquse he got to greedy. once we were recognized as a sovereign nation by the US, jimmy had ‘visions’ of him being one of the greatest leaders of our tribe. we as a nation were content with the way our tribe was running. his vision was for the Osage to control osage county and in essence he would become ruler of the land, so to speak. i am not trying to be funny, i am being serious. its not the tribes position its jimmys position. he promised the osage people that we would have reservation status, no question. jimmy lied. jimmy is not a leader, he is a snake who only takes care of his own. read “The Cleaners” comments…he hits the nail right on the head. we are critical because a snake oil salesman posed as an osage and fooled some of the masses. Marguerite, i could not agree more with you.
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tricky ricky, bartlesville (18 hours ago)
chief
i don”t think it was because of anti- incumbent mood. i have talked to voting osages and they were not happy with the ways things was going. read the article above -you might figure out why you was not voted back in. no hard feeling on my part i have always found you easy to talk to. i might not always agreed with you, but you would take the time to talk. good luck in the future. i might add i”m not osage
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Not in the Herd, Broken Arrow (17 hours ago)
Let’s hope that whoever wins the runoff, Red Eagle or Tallchief, fixes this casino business because I, like maggetsic1, would like to continue to be employed with the OMDEC.
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osagerez, on the rez (16 hours ago)
Nikia Parker is a nephew of the grays but he is well grounded and a family man who really cares about his employees, makes good decisions, and looks after the best interests of the osage casinos. I dont think its fair to get rid of him because he is related to the Grays. ask anyone he works with about him and see if they say something negative about him. Nikia is a good osage man.
Read more from this Tulsa World article at http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=11&articleid=20100609_11_A1_TheOsa376546
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First of all we don’t even know if the final election numbers are accurate. It has been proven that absentee ballots were never mailed, the counting machine malfunctioned and ballots were destroyed. Folks, that’s what we know what went wrong, what about the unknown?! I’d hate to think that I took a day off work and drove hundreds of miles only for my ballot to be destroyed. My voice lost. I don’t see how we can move forward with the run-offs knowing so many voices were silenced by errors.
The real losers of Election 2010 were the Osage people.
I think we got hosed by the company True Ballot
Me too.
I think it is wrong to kick someone when they are down! Lets hope for the best for our Osage Nation – John Redeagle will be Ki-He-Ka and Scott Bighorse will be Ki-he-ka O-wa-da! Some good people were elected, some good people were not elected, and some people who should not have been elected were elected but once it is all said and done – we must support our elected officials and build them up in order to build up the Osage Nation rather than tear them down which tears down the Osage Nation – when we see something we don’t like we can let them know – with respect! I think everyone now knows how important it is to vote and how an election can change things. Congratulations and good luck to those who were elected and best wishes and good luck to those who were not elected! There are no winners or losers – only those who were elected and those who were not elected!
The ballot debacle is another issue! It does seem contrary to good sense for a competent company in charge of an election process to have so many problems but this apparently is an “American” tradition! How many people believe that the “Chicago” voting machine was the only reason J.F. Kennedy was elected (not my opinion personally – I don’t know) or how the “Florida” machine or rather the Supreme Court got Bush elected! Seems in this day and age this should be a seamless process by now! Instead, there are always questions and always doubts! Were there any Osage citizens there this year as “watchers” or observers!
Where was the voting machine to insert our ballots? Why did I hear of someone voting absentee and then voting again at the polling station? Why did it take 5 hours to post the results? Maybe there are simple answers to my questions if so, someone please respond.
The Osage News posted a story on the delay. Don’t know if it has all the answers but here is the URL:
http://osagenews.org/2010/06/delay-in-election-results-election-night-had-some-osages-angry/
And also, Mary Oklah, I hope you never trashed Jim Gray like so many others did on these blogs. It would be hypocritical indeed for everyone to now point fingers and say, “You’re disrespectful if you talk trash about John Red Eagle.”
Pot, I would like to introduce you to Kettle. Kettle, this is Pot.
Mary Oklah I appreciate your positive attitude and willingness to support our future congress and leaders but I have to be honest I have my doubts. If the behavior & performance of our re-elected officials is an indicator of our future, we’re in sad shape.
At any rate, it’s a motley crew. I’m sure we can agree on that.
That we can.
The election was irritatingly handled, but lets be serious. There was nothing in it that will change the outcome. Jim Gray and anyone associated with him, got his head handed to him and deservedly so. And it was by a large margin. A few absentee ballots missed will not change that. And Ryan you were so in love with the idea of voting in the last election, you were willing to take a terribly written constitution, and vote it into law. How about taking the time to do it right and save us all a lot of grief? And I don’t I have heard a word out of you about the snafus in the 2006 election that would have made a difference in the outcome. If you all are so surprised by the results I would suggest that it is because you had blinders on and were not paying attention to rest of the people outside this forum. Osagemary, the people spoke loudly, firmly, and clearly, deal with it.
Kelly, I was not and am still not fully informed about all snafus of the 2006 election but from what I remember many of them seem to be the same problems that we encountered during this one. Only last time we got the results wayyyyyy faster. I wondered if technology had digressed at all. And for any of us on the ground…and trust me I talked to a lot of people that night, and it didn’t matter who they were supporting…most people felt like something was amiss. And they were right, those kind of things cast doubt as to the legitimacy of the election when they do not go precise and as smoothly as we expect them too. It’s relevant as to whether a vote or any vote that is not counted changes the election. However, what I am saying is that if there is an Osage out there, regardless of their political leanings their votes were mismanaged. And it doesn’t matter if it happens in 2006 or 2010 (or even if it changes the outcome). It’s the exact same problem and needs to be addressed. I didn’t have any problems voting, but several people told me their family members never received their absentee ballots (same problem as in 2006). (Which is why I posted the thread asking about the election problems. As you can see the son of the top vote getter is asking the same questions I am, so its hard to infer someone is a sore loser when the winner is the one asking the questions about its management) And the fact that the Osage people foot the bill for a badly managed service twice, I find disheartening. I think the integrity of our elections is something that is important to all Osages, and I feel I would still be writing this no matter who the winners were. To be honest, I am excited there is some new blood in there, with new ideas.
I’m in no way shape or form contesting the results. I’m just saying we have an interesting array of people that got elected that come from a wide demographic and represent a wide variety of opinions. These 6 newly elected officials hardly represent two view points, rather its more like a dradle (those have 6 sides don’t they?).
And yes I am still in love with the idea of voting. If it’s the will of the Osage people to change the constitution (and it should never be considered a static document anyway) then that’s what should be done. The laws these elected officials pass should represent the will of the people because if they don’t… well.. they won’t get elected next time.
Let us pray for them because they will need all the help they can to keep this car on the road.
Thank you Ryan for getting it. Yes, I am disappointed with most of the results but I’m even more disappointed in the mismangement and gross way the election was handled. And then to add insult to injury if we dispute the results, due to their negligence, we have to pay an additional $300 – $500 (I’m not sure of the exact amount) for a recount. This is a disgrace and for our election committee to accept it, and for our tribal members to accept it is unforgivable. We should expect more for ourselves and we definitely deserve better!
Yes, Kelly, I’ll get over the results, I have no choice. I can only hope the best of what we have to work with gets elected for Chief. What I find so disheartening is to watch the Chickasaws, the Cherokees, the Muskogee’s, heck every tribe in the state succeeding and providing a future for their tribal people. They get it. No, I wasn’t crazy about Chief , most of his staff, and a lot of his politics but at least he understood, or so it seemed, what it took to survive and grow in today’s world of business.
It’s like the election process, we should expect more for ourselves and I know we definitely deserve better!
In defense of the election board, they didn’t have much time. They were appointed late by Chief Gray, then their hands were tied because they couldn’t get their budget passed by Congress (because some of them were snivelling about pointless details) and then they didn’t have any applicants for an election supervisor (or one that the exec branch would approve of – depending on who you want to believe) and then these TrueBallot guys come in talking fast and with time running out I’m sure they felt they had to do something. Hopefully for the 2012 election there will be much more preparation and organization, in fact I’m sure there will be – plus a different election company.
As far as something being amiss….well, I think we just have to give credit to Team Osage for being more organized than anyone thought they could be. When the Team Osage flyer first came out it made many Osages laugh because most of those people on there are some pretty funny characters with some scandalous histories. But when they got the OSA members and the peeps from the shareholders blog to unite and vote as a block, that’s when they took the election. Too bad these people who voted off a list they got in the mail didn’t take the time to become informed.
Now that the playing field is even in the principal chief and asst chief race, I wonder if Osages will pay attention to these candidate’s qualifications or choose based on personalities? Either way, it’s going to be interesting. Who knew Sonny Abbott was such a political mastermind? LOL
Hello,
We have been hearing reports that there are many people who did not receive their requested absentee ballots or, people received an absentee ballot but never requested one. If this has happened to you, or someone you know, and you want the Osage people to know about it, please contact us at (918) 287-5669 or e-mail me at [email protected].
Shannon Shaw
Osage News
Interim Editor
I don’t really understand why thawdley mentioned my name about trashing anyone or telling anyone shame on you for trashing John Red Eagle. I don’t recall saying anything like that or anything that would cause such a comment. I have always said that we should support our elected leaders long before this election and show them respect. When I had a concern, I emailed or wrote letters or occasionally called but did not trash anyone on forums, etc. I think Jim Gray was excellent in representing the Osage tribe in his presentations and talks and did good things for the tribe but probably made mistakes like any human might. I think John Red Eagle will make an excellent representative for the tribe as well and will undoubtedly not be perfect because no human being is perfect – but I will support him all the way. Those who do trash others should remember they are not perfect either and those that criticize the most probably would not be able to do what our elected officials do. Those running for office should be commended on their willingness to serve and take such abuse. I am sure I have posted this to late for anyone to notice and will probably not come back to this subject again. I just wish everyone the best whether I voted for them or not because when they “do” do their best – they are doing it for me as well as for everyone!