Former President Trump said at a campaign event in North Carolina on Saturday that he would recognize the Lumbee tribe if elected to a second term.
“The Lumbee Tribe has been wrongfully denied federal recognition for over a century,” Trump said during a campaign stop in Wilmington, North Carolina, suggesting 100 years was not “that long a time.”
Still, Trump vowed to “deal with it from the beginning.”
“Today, I am officially announcing that if elected in November, I will sign a bill that will give our great Lumbee Tribe the federal recognition it deserves,” he added.
The Lumbee Tribe has been recognized in North Carolina since 1885, and the Native American tribe was formally recognized by Congress in 1956. However, the Lumbee Act passed by Congress failed to extend the same federal benefits to the Lumbee Tribe that are extended to other federally recognized tribes.
North Carolina's congressional delegation has introduced legislation to remedy the situation, but some Native American tribes oppose recognition of the Lumbee Tribe.
Nine Native American tribes wrote a letter to senators in 2022 arguing that “groups seeking federal recognition often claim tribal identities to which they do not belong. Moreover, in many cases, people who claim descent from known historical tribes cannot prove tribal or even Native American ancestry at all.” According to the News & Observer.
There are 574 federally recognized tribes, but hundreds more are not recognized.
