South Dakota’s official out-of-state dentistry endorser Kristi Noem, who is also the Republican governor of the state, has been banned from a South Dakota Sioux reservation for making comments linking tribal leaders to drug cartels, the Guardian reports.
“This person has made a lot of accusations about the tribes, about the cartel, council representatives being in bed with the cartel, stuff like that,” Robert Walters, a Cheyenne River Sioux representative said during a tribal council meeting this week. “It’s all false information. I make a motion at this time to banish her from the Cheyenne River Reservation … I believe there has to be some kind of policy set up for her to show up at these tribal meetings. She can’t just go in there and do her thing.” This is the second reservation Noem has been barred from; the Oglala Sioux tribe barred Noem from its lands in February.
“We’ve got some tribal leaders that I believe are personally benefiting from the cartels being there and that’s why they attack me every day. But I’m going to fight for the people who actually live in those situations, who call me and text me every day and say, ‘Please, dear governor, please come help us in Pine Ridge. We are scared,’” Noem said at a March community meeting in Winner.