https://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/the-supreme-court-just-gave-away-half-of-the-state-of-oklahoma . The stunning Supreme Court decision regarding Donald Trump’s tax records is making headlines all over the globe, and this is causing a far more important Supreme Court decision to fly under the radar. In a 5-4 decision written by Neil Gorsuch and joined by four of the other liberal justices, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that about half of the state of Oklahoma belongs to Native American tribes even though the state of Oklahoma has “maintained unquestioned jurisdiction” over that land for more than 100 years. In other words, there are now approximately 1.8 million former Oklahoma residents that suddenly live on land that no longer belongs to Oklahoma. And now that the Supreme Court has handed down this ruling, there will be countless other Native American tribes that will be going to court with claims of sovereignty which will need to be resolved. . What a mess.
Of course Congress could transfer sovereignty over those areas back to the state of Oklahoma by formally disestablishing the reservations on Oklahoma land, but with Democrats in control of the House of Representatives there is zero chance of that happening at this point.
So for the foreseeable future, 1.8 million people in eastern Oklahoma are stuck in a really bizarre situation. The state of Oklahoma no longer has jurisdiction over them, but the five Native American tribes that have now been given jurisdiction are completely unequipped to exercise sovereignty over those areas because they haven’t done it in more than 100 years.