Members of the Seminole Tribe of Florida rejected claims that $3 million in federal Covid funds was mishandled. The money was spent on prizes as a way to entice tribal members to get vaccinated.
Critics have since alleged that tribal leadership, including Seminole Chairman Marcellus Osceola, knew that many who got the shot were not entered in the drawing and missed out on money they were entitled to.
Many of the Seminoles were hesitant to get vaccinated and Osceola believed the lottery was a good way to get tribe members to participate. The lottery had a first-place prize of $1 million. Second place was $750,000, third $500,000, fourth $250,000 and fifth $100,000. Twenty other people received $20,000. All who entered and got the vaccine received $500.
The Florida Bulldog, a news organization that specializes in watchdog stories, said there was anonymity centered around who got the prizes.
The U.S. Treasury, which oversees the funding, allowed many Native American tribes to use Covid relief funds for drawings and other incentives for tribal members to get vaccinated.
Some members started a petition to recall Osceola in December. The petition was signed by 285 members, well above the 20 percent required of voters who cast ballots for Osceola in his 2019 reelection.
Laura Billie, a tribal member who authored the recall effort, said the allocation of the funds was “improper.” Billie also told the Bulldog that “tribal members also have knowledge that the Chairman’s illegitimate son, who is a minor, was the [first prize] million-dollar winner.”
Osceola denied the charges and threatened legal action. “(The) false claim of a million-dollar winner being my illegitimate son, you know, that has repercussions, those allegations, because, you know, again, defamation of character, slander. People get sued for a lot less.”
The Seminole Tribal Council said in a statement that the lottery was run fairly and ethically.
“Winners were chosen at random via computer-selected names of all vaccinated members” the statement read. “To ensure a fair outcome, one non-Tribe staff member from the Tribe’s Health, IT and Police Departments were the only individuals present at the time of the drawing. The selected names were not made public due to privacy requirements for all health records. […] It is impossible to know how many lives were saved. Any suggestion of impropriety in any aspect of the program is absolutely not true.”
