What Happened?

Tribal casinos and the government contracts your tax dollars pay for are on the to-do list for the Cherokee Nation’s lobbyists. Five firms reported $310,000 in fees from the tribe for July through September, up from $300,000 in each of the first two quarters, according to their federal filings and a Legis1 review of the tribe’s lobbying disclosures. ​

The extra $10,000 came from a new firm, Powers Pyles Sutter & Verville PC, which lobbies on Indian gaming. Firms must round these figures to the nearest $10,000, so they’re estimates, not exact bills.

  • Steptoe LLP: $120,000
  • Ragnar Group LLC: $90,000
  • Cornerstone Government Affairs Inc.: $90,000
  • Powers Pyles Sutter & Verville PC: $10,000

Steptoe, the biggest earner, lists only “issues relating to tribal law.” Cornerstone’s report names about a dozen topics, including a program that helps tribe-owned businesses win federal contracts.

Why Does it Matter to Me?

That program, run by the Small Business Administration and known as Native 8(a), can matter to whole local economies. Markwayne Mullin, then a Republican senator from Oklahoma and now Homeland Security secretary, told a Feb. 10 Senate hearing that “rural northeast Oklahoma would hurt incredibly bad if suddenly contracting was sucked out of the economy.”

A bill none of the firms mention could affect anyone who works at a tribal casino, hotel or other tribe-owned business. Since 2004, most of those workers have had the same federal right to form a union as anyone else, says Congress’s research office. Under the Tribal Labor Sovereignty Act, that federal labor law would no longer apply to businesses a tribe owns and runs on its own land, including some land in Oklahoma.

Both Sides, Now

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), who chairs the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, defended the contracting program at the hearing, saying it “was not based on race” but on Congress’s constitutional role in dealing with tribes. Trump administration officials see it differently. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has called 8(a) the government’s oldest diversity, equity and inclusion program, and the Small Business Administration suspended about a quarter of its firms in January over missing paperwork, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

The labor bill’s sponsor, Rep. John Moolenaar (R-MI), says “tribal governments should have the same authority as every other level of government in America,” in a statement after a House committee approved the bill 19 to 16 in September 2025. The AFL-CIO, a national federation of labor unions, warned in a November 2025 letter that hundreds of thousands of workers at tribal casinos and hotels would lose those federal protections.

What Happens Next?

The House bill, H.R. 1723, has been waiting for a full House vote since its committee sent it to the floor Jan. 16. The Senate version, S. 1301, first needs a yes from Murkowski’s committee.

The firms’ next lobbying reports, covering October through December, are due Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2027. They’ll show whether the tribe’s lobbying stays near $300,000 and whether any firm takes up the labor bill.

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