Benefit for Native Americans, or a grift for NGOs? ….Additional data with regard to the recent O’Keefe expose
Introduction
Economist Milton Friedman taught that competitive capitalism is both a vehicle for economic freedom and a necessity for political freedom (Friedman and Friedman 2002) (E. Morris 2025). Government control of resources and property destroys liberty and government control of the media destroys free speech – thus it is impossible to preserve political freedom in a system where the government controls the economy. As both the federal and tribal governments practice extreme over-reach upon tribal members, the free-market theory of economics and private property ownership is paramount with regard to political and economic conditions within the reservation system (E. Morris 2025).
“Economist Shawn Regan, in his article, Ways The Government Keeps Native Americans In Poverty, examined federal policies that impede tribal members from attaining financial success and hinder economic development in Indian Country (Regan 2014)” (E. Morris 2025). Regan, along with economists Sowell (2009, 244-245), Alston, and T. Anderson, believes full title to property is necessary for financial leverage – and thus individual and community health and growth (E. Morris 2025).
Economic development in Indian Country requires the establishment of financial institutions and proper stewardship of resources. But it also requires proper oversight, accountability and audit. While much attention has recently been brought upon the widespread corruption within the federal government, the corruption that flows to and through tribal entities with the help of federal dollars remains almost a taboo topic.
Case Point #1: Selling bonds on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Was Hunter Biden Trying to Exploit Tribal Sovereignty?
Many Americans know that on May 12, 2014, Hunter Biden was placed on the board of Burisma, the Ukrainian private oil and gas company (U.S. HSGAC – Finance Committees 2020, 66). His partner, Devon Archer, had been placed on the board three weeks earlier. According to State Department records, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) funded the Municipal Energy Reform Program (MERP), which entered into a ‘Memorandum of Understanding’ with Burisma on October 13, 2014” (U.S. HSGAC – Finance Committees 2020, 15 ftn).
What many are not aware of was Biden’s involvement in a financial crime that used a relatively unregulated bond opportunity on the Pine Ridge Reservation. A payday loan company, established by Raycen Raines around 2012, was initially unaffiliated with Biden and his friends. Located within Oglala Lakota County, which was designated by the U.S. Census Bureau in 1980 as the poorest county in the nation,” loans were made around the country as an “official tribal entity,” free from interference by state regulators” (Morris 2020)…
Or click on the below document image to read the pdf here…
– https://open.substack.com/pub/federalindianpolicy/p/the-game-using-sovereign-status-of?r=1eqjr2&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true