Before the year’s end, President Donald Trump is expected to sign a bill that would give Alaska Native Veterans an extension to file for their Native allotments.

As KNBA’s Rhonda McBride tells us, more time is needed to help veterans navigate what they say has been a cumbersome and frustrating process.

After several failed attempts to get the Senate to pass an extension, the window for Alaska Native veterans to claim federal land was about to close forever. But on December 16, U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK)’s bill passed by unanimous consent.

The Republican senator tied the veterans’ extension to three other bills that had bipartisan support.

“It wasn’t easy, but we got this done at the buzzer. It’s going to be signed into law. It’s going to go over to the White House The president is going to sign this. And we’re going to get to work and get these heroes the land allotments that they deserved.”

Benno Cleveland opens his Purple Heart award, which he received in the mail while in Dong Tam, Vietnam. He was recovering from shrapnel injuries to his eye. (Courtesy Benno Cleveland)

Benno Cleveland (Inupiaq), president of the Alaska Native Veterans Council, has waited for this moment for a long time.

“I felt very happy, content within the heart. We’ve been battling with the Alaska Native Vietnam veterans land allotment for over 30 years.”

The bill now gives Alaska Native veterans until 2030 to claim 160 acres of federal land, made available to them under a law Congress passed more than a 100 years ago.

But when the federal program ended in 1971, Vietnam vets missed out, because many were overseas fighting the war.

An estimated 2,000 veterans are eligible for the program, but as of mid-month, only about 25% had filed.

Native vets said they had difficulty meeting the deadline, due to a complicated process and limited land availability.

Cleveland hopes the extension will also allow more time to convince Congress to make more federal land available for veterans, closer to their homelands. He says they deserve it.

“We’ve all gone through hell. But we went when our country called, and we did our duty to the nation and to our people.”

Cleveland says it is a shame politics gets in the way of honoring veterans, but the important thing, he says, is that Congress finally got the job done.

A post marks where Enbridge’s Line 5 crosses the reservation of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo: Danielle Kaeding / WPR)

A Wisconsin tribe is suing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

As Danielle Kaeding reports, the Bad River tribe has filed a lawsuit to overturn a federal permit for a Canadian energy firm’s plans to reroute its oil and gas pipeline.

Earthjustice attorney Gussie Lord represents the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa.

Lord claims the Army Corps violated federal environmental laws when it issued a permit this fall to Canadian energy firm Enbridge.

She says the agency failed to adequately review environmental effects of the company’s plans to build a 41-mile segment of its Line 5 pipeline around the tribe’s reservation.

“They didn’t do that in a number of ways, including the threat of an oil spill, threat of impacts to on and off-reservation exercise of treaty rights, and also, the state’s water quality certification has been challenged by the band, and that’s not final.”

Enbridge wants to build a new stretch of Line 5 after the tribe sued in 2019 to shut down the pipeline on its lands.

Bad River Tribal Chairwoman Elizabeth Arbuckle said the tribe and other communities would “suffer unacceptable consequences” in the event of an oil spill.

An Enbridge spokesperson said the company’s permit is not yet final, but it plans to defend the Corps’ upcoming decision in the lawsuit.

A Facebook post and email from the owner of the Grand Gateway Hotel calls for a ban on Native American guests. The manager said the hotel would not ban anyone, but the community is still protesting. (Graphic: Josh Haiar / SDPB)

A jury ruled on Friday in favor of the Native-led organization NDN Collective and individual plaintiffs in a discrimination lawsuit against the owners of the Grand Gateway Hotel in Rapid City, S.D.

NDN Collective will be paid $1, a request made by the organization.

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Monday, December 22, 2025 – The Year in Native News