The Biden administration announced on Thursday that it would be investing $343 million in enhancing tribal water resources and boosting conservation efforts across the Colorado River Basin.

More than two-thirds of that total — $233 million — will be heading to the Gila River Indian Community for water conservation projects, which will help ensure the stability and sustainability of the Colorado River for water users across the basin, according to the Interior Department.

New York’s Native American tribes fought bitterly with former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo over his efforts to tax their tobacco sales and seize a sizable share of their gambling proceeds, and they blamed him for the deterioration of a stretch of interstate that slices through tribal lands.

Following a multiyear campaign backed by tribal nations, conservationists and local governments in Southern Nevada, President Joe Biden used his executive authority on Tuesday to establish a new national monument encompassing roughly 500,000 acres across Southern Nevada. 

Gov. Joe Lombardo (R-NV) blasted President Joe Biden on Tuesday for locking up 500,000 acres of mineral-rich land in Nevada and Texas. He said the move would be tough on Nevadans for generations.

Lombardo said the White House did not respond to any of his concerns before the announcement of the 506,000-acre Avi Kwa Ame National Monument in southern Nevada. Lombardo said his office reached out.

President Joe Biden on Tuesday officially designated a new national monument in Southern Nevada while speaking at a conservation event at the Interior Department.

At more than 506,000 acres, the Avi Kwa Ame National Monument is one of the largest tracts of land to come under federal protection so far during Biden’s presidency, preserving Nevada’s Spirit Mountain and the desert around it.

“It’s a place of reverence, a place of spirituality, a place of healing,” Biden said Tuesday. “It will now be recognized for the significance it holds and be preserved forever.”

Native American tribes could expand their gambling operations in the U.S., including pursuing lucrative online betting, under new rule changes proposed by the federal government.

The proposals from the Bureau of Indian Affairs include easing rules for tribes to acquire additional land, which could ultimately be approved for casino development. New rules would also ensure that tribes can negotiate online-betting deals with states. 

Imagine having to drive nine hours away for a medical procedure you’re in desperate need of. As you might’ve heard, this is a shitty new reality for people in the United States living in areas where abortion is banned. But the taxing journey to seeking an abortion has actually been a reality for many Native Americans for quite some time.

Hundreds of the 574 federally recognized Indian nations in the U.S. now routinely provide their citizens with the full array of services customarily expected from state and local governments, from tax collection to environmental protection regulations. At the same time, many tribes are becoming the economic engines of their regions.

All this has happened over the past several decades under federal policies that, unlike previous policies, support tribal self-determination through self-government.

There’s not much consensus these days in the fractious U.S. House of Representatives. But for two proposals presented to the chamber floor on Feb. 6, there was a rare glimpse of what bipartisan accord looks like.

The House—in proceedings orchestrated by Speaker Pro. Tem. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene—adopted a pair of bills granting Native American tribes’ requests for trust designations on lands in Tennessee and California, ceding them to the U.S. Department of Interior (DOI) as shields against development.

A federal appeals court said the government inappropriately ignored the dangers of hazardous air pollutants when issuing permits to drill oil and gas wells in northwestern New Mexico, in what environmental groups say is a "new precedent" that will help protect community health.