Kevin K. Washburn, head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs October 19 announced the Final Rule on Secretarial elections.
He announced that the Department of the Interior, “finalized updates to Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) regulations on Secretarial elections for tribal governments that will, among other things, protect the rights of tribal members living away from their communities to vote in these elections.”
The rule makes it easier for tribal members who live far from their reservations to vote in Secretarial elections by allowing for mail-out ballots.
He announced the rationale for the rule change by declaring “our Secretarial election amendments seek to prevent tribal members living in urban areas from being inadvertently disenfranchised in Secretarial elections.”
The rule recognizes that many members of tribes choose not to live on the reservation but often live in nearby cities.
The Final Rule pronounces the old rules as “anachronistic and inconsistent with modern policies favoring tribal self-governance.”
