MANDAREE, N.D.-
American Indian rancher Keith Mandan says he could double the size of his black Angus herd if he had the money–or if he were white.
Mandan, 53, and his wife, Claryca, 52, say they’ve struggled financially to keep their ranch in North Dakota’s Badlands since the late 1970s because of a pattern of discrimination by the federal government.
The Mandans are among the plaintiffs in a lawsuit that accuses the U.S. Department of Agriculture of discriminating against American Indians in the granting of loans since 1981. During that time, Claryca Mandan said, the federal government “wiped out a whole generation of Indian farmers and ranchers because of racism.”
USDA officials refused to respond to specific questions from The Associated Press about the allegations. In a statement, J. Michael Kelly, an attorney for the USDA, said the case is still ongoing and the agency is working to provide documentation requested by the Indians’ attorneys.
Earlier this month, attorneys for the American Indian ranchers and farmers filed a motion to bring the case to trial next year–eight years after the lawsuit was filed.
A hearing on their motion is set for Thursday.
Keith Mandan said if he could get the financing, he’d buy about 300 more cows and build a calving barn and a machine shed to keep his cattle and farm implements protected from the harsh North Dakota winters. Instead, Mandan uses a heavily wooded gulch for calving. His machinery is exposed to the elements.
“My white counterparts across the road don’t have the problems we have,” he said. “We just don’t receive the subsidies that non-Indian farmers and ranchers do.”
The USDA’s Farm Service Agency lends to farmers and ranchers who can’t get credit from commercial lenders. The agency, known as the lender of last resort, is the largest agricultural lender in North Dakota.
Mandan believes the USDA has denied and delayed loans to American Indians to squeeze them out of business.
“They just want to close you out and take the land and put it in their inventory,” he said.
The lawsuit was granted class-action status in 2001 but the case has floundered in federal court since.
Attorneys estimate the number of Indian farmer and rancher plaintiffs could be in the tens of thousands. A settlement figure has not been calculated, but would likely be in the “hundreds of millions,” said Joe Sellers, the American Indians’ lead attorney in Washington, D.C.
The lawsuit mirrors a civil rights case brought by black farmers in 1997 that settled two years later.
The federal government has paid out about $930 million to about 14,000 black farmers so far, said Anurag Varma, a Washington, D.C., attorney who helped represent the farmers and is involved in the American Indians’ lawsuit.
“The underlying bad acts by the defendants are virtually identical,” Varma said.
Sellers accuses the government of delaying resolution of the lawsuit filed by the American Indian ranchers and farmers.
“They have employed every tactical maneuver I can conceive of to postpone the day of judgment,” he said.
But government attorneys said the case has been delayed in part by their appeal of the class action decision.
“We do take exception that we are dragging our feet,” said Charles Miller, a spokesman for the Justice Department, which is representing USDA.
Meanwhile, Sellers said, the USDA continues to foreclose on Indian property.
“They have accelerated debt collection,” Sellers said. “It seems to me it’s an effort to drive the final nail in the coffin.”
Three Affiliated Tribes Chairman Tex Hall, who also is a rancher, calls it economic racism.
“It’s illegal, racist and discriminatory,” Hall said. “Every day this continues, we lose another native farmer or rancher.”
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