Lumbee Tribe achieves federal recognition amid controversy

While there is cause for celebration of the federal recognition for the Lumbees, the North Carolina Tuscarora and Cherokees state the act questions the fairness of not requiring tribal ancestry verification while the Bureau of Indian Affairs faces funding cuts.

Lumbee Federal Recognition Impact

Federal recognition of the Lumbee Tribe grants the Lumbees living anywhere, including Moore, Lee and Harnett Counties, access to federal programs such as healthcare, housing, and education, and will improve the Robeson County’s infrastructure and economic development.

Compared with Moore, Lee and Harnett counties, Robeson County ranks lowest in economics and public safety. Robeson County has the highest poverty rate and higher violent crime rates. It has a manufacturing presence but has lower wages.

Robeson has chanted, “Casino!” for decades, and with its reality on the horizon, the county will increase its tax base to cover increased services such as law enforcement and public schools.

Fairness in Sovereignty

The federal government’s Lumbee recognition in the National Defense Authorization Act on Dec. 18, 2025, passed on a promise from Republicans: North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis and then Presidential Candidate Donald Trump.

All other tribes have been required to prove ancestral native identity.

Robeson County, the primary residence of the Lumbee population, experienced a recent political transition. An area once governed by Democrats has become prominently Republican.

The Lumbee Tribe makes up a significant voting bloc in the pivotal state, which Trump secured with a margin exceeding three percentage points.

Genealogy

During the fight for federal recognition for over a century, the Lumbees have identified as different tribes. In the late 19th century, the State of North Carolina recognized them as the Croatan Indians, connecting them to the Lost Colony.

In 1911, the state renamed the people the Indians of Robeson County, emphasizing geography.

In the 20th century, Lumbee officials told Congress they were the Cherokee Indians of Robeson County. In 1952, the people adopted the name Lumbee, derived from the Lumber River, and that name became federal law with the 1956 Lumbee Act.

Dr. Peter H. Wood, a retired Duke University professor of history, authored “Tuscarora Roots: An Historical Report Regarding the Relation of the Hatteras Tuscarora Tribe of Robeson County, North Carolina to the Original Tuscarora Indian Tribe.” It is available at the UNC-Chapel Hill Special Collections’ Library. The scholarly work is not available at the UNC-Pembroke Special Collections Library in Robeson County because the director refused it, saying, “We are a Lumbee college,” in Dec. 2019.

Wood’s “Tuscarora Roots” includes a genealogical report on the natives of Robeson County. Read the history and surnames on the descendants charts here.

To register as a Lumbee at the Robeson County headquarters, a person must show their surname matches on the list of names on the Lumbee roll, which includes Tuscarora names in Wood’s descendants’ charts.

Did the federal government inadvertently recognize Tuscaroras in North Carolina who have the same surnames as people who identify as Lumbee? That is a question for a team of political, historical, scientific and legislative officials.

Lumbee Tribe

The Lumbee Tribe website shares “The President of the United States, Donald Trump, has signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) which included the Lumbee Fairness Act. Chairman John L. Lowery was with President Trump for this historic moment in Lumbee History. It is confirmed the Lumbee Tribe of N.C. is fully Federally Recognized as the 575th Tribe in the nation on this the 18th day of December 2025. Chairman Lowery said, “I had the honor of witnessing President Trump sign the National Defense Authorization Act, and in that moment our legal limbo finally ended. The injustice of the 1956 Act has been corrected, a relic of the Indian Termination Era has been erased, and the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina is now fully and rightfully recognized.”

The Tuscarora in North Carolina

The Lumbee injustice was corrected but what about the North Carolina Tuscaroras’ injustice?

According to Robeson County Tuscarora native, Rahnà·wakę·w Donnie McDowell, Skarù·ręʔ Urihwaká·yę̀·ʔ Nyakwarihwatù·ręh, Co-Chair, Tuscarora Historical & Preservation Society, Drowning Creek Longhouse, Beaver Clan, the government did not keep its promise to his people in 1712.

President Trump kept his election promise to the Lumbees.

“The recent passage of the Lumbee Fairness rider to the National Defense Authorization Act raises serious concerns for the Tuscarora Nation of North Carolina, whose sovereignty and treaty rights long predate the Lumbee Tribe, the State of North Carolina, and the United States.

From the early eighteenth century forward, the Tuscarora entered into solemn treaties with colonial governments, the State of North Carolina, the Commonwealth of Virginia, and later the United States. These include the Tuscarora Treaty of 1712, which established conditions for peace, accountability, and mutual responsibility; the Indian Woods treaties affirming defined homelands; and the 1803 treaty ratified under President Thomas Jefferson, which recognized the Tuscarora Nation as a distinct political people capable of negotiating land, governance, and relations under federal protection.

In the Skarù·ręʔ (Tuscarora) worldview, peace does not arise from submission, but from the maintenance of relationships grounded in truth, responsibility, and continuity. The treaties entered into by the Tuscarora were not favors granted by a superior power, but binding agreements made between sovereigns. As such, they remain obligations that cannot be extinguished by later legislation or by the federal acknowledgment of another tribe.

Skarù·ręʔ teachings hold that integrity requires accountability across generations, and that accountability requires honoring one’s word. While the Lumbee Tribe has now received federal acknowledgment, that action does not dissolve the state and federal governments’ responsibilities to the Tuscarora Nation, nor does it authorize the subsuming of Tuscarora people, lands, or jurisdiction into another political body.

The Tuscarora Nation has never consented to such erasure. At the same time, the Tuscarora Nation of North Carolina extends sincere respect to the Lumbee Tribe and wishes them success as they move forward following recognition.

Our commitment remains to uphold our own treaties; to fulfill our responsibilities to our people, homelands, ancestral rivers, and extended animal relatives; and to maintain peaceful coexistence without domination or interference. Upholding the Tuscarora treaties is not an obstacle to fairness – it is the measure of it. Through this balance of respect, accountability, and responsibility, true and lasting peace is sustained,” McDowell stated in an email.

A Cherokee Citizen’s Perspective

Complaints about Lumbee federal recognition have flooded social media.

“Folding the Lumbee Fairness Act into the NDAA is a cloak and dagger maneuver. Congress attached a long-stalled attempt for Federal recognition for the Lumbee Group to a “must-pass” legislation like defense spending because it virtually guarantees passage. Keep in mind the NDAA is one of the few bills Congress passes every year without fail. Attaching Lumbee recognition ensured it wouldn’t stall yet again. Their recognition attempts have repeatedly died in committee or failed to even get floor time. By sliding it in the NDAA, supporters sidestepped the entire debate. So, lawmakers who might be hesitate on Lumbee recognition vote “yes” on the NDAA for defense reasons, while still delivering recognition. They slithered in like a sneaky snake,” posted Cathie Owle on Facebook Dec. 16.

Owle works at Harrah’s Cherokee Casino Resort.

Bureau of Indian Affairs Funding

The U.S. Department of Interior has not indicated any increase to the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) funding, but Trump has proposed cuts.

The Lumbee Tribe is the largest, with about 65,000 members.

Trump’s FY 2026 budget proposal cuts several major tribal program budgets. The BIA budget would drop from $2.91 billion to about $2.18 billion.

Indian Housing Block Grants would plunge from $1.12 billion to $872 million.

Indian Health Services is marked to increase slightly from $7.8 billion in FY 2025 to about $7.9 billion in FY 2026, still below a FY 2024 high of approximately $8.5 billion.

Tribal colleges and universities face extreme proposed cuts.

Congress has historically rejected some of these proposed cuts and sometimes increased funding for tribal public safety and justice and healthcare in appropriations bills, showing that tribal spending depends on Congress as much as the president’s budget requests.

Based on the available evidence, the “pie” budget will be restructured with smaller servings to provide services to the newly recognized 60,000 federally recognized natives.

Learn more on the BIA budget here.

Dec. 19, 2025

Stephanie M. Sellers

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