News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed

Bill to Make the Tulsa Race Massacre Site a National Monument Faces Uncertain Future

Published

2 months ago

June 5, 2025

oklahomawatch.org – Em Luetkemeyer – 2025-06-05 06:00:00

by Em Luetkemeyer, Oklahoma Watch
June 5, 2025

Legislation to designate the site of the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 as a national monument breezed through the Senate last month, but its path through the House is less certain.

The bipartisan effort from Sens. James Lankford and Cory Booker would also establish an advisory commission appointed by the interior secretary that would be made up in part by descendants of massacre victims. At least one House Republican from Oklahoma is hesitant to outright endorse the existing legislation.

Rep. Kevin Hern, whose district covers part of Tulsa and who serves as policy chair of the House Republican Conference, has some preliminary concerns.

“Congressman Hern has heard many concerns from constituents in the community with the bill as it’s currently written,” Miranda Dabney, Hern’s spokesperson, said in an email. “These will need to be addressed before the bill can move forward in the House.”

Hern’s office did not provide additional details. And Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise did not respond to inquiries about what, if anything, they are planning to do with the bill.

The massacre was a two-day militarized attack by white Tulsans on a prosperous Black community known as Black Wall Street, which killed hundreds and burned city blocks to the ground. The massacre got revitalized attention after the protests in 2020 against racial violence, and again a year later for its centennial anniversary.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration has sought to restore some of the monuments that have been taken down or changed in the past several years, such as statues of Confederate generals.

But in the Senate, proponents of the bill to designate the Tulsa Race Massacre site as a national monument said it should be a priority.

“The urgency with which the survivors and the community asked me to do this was something that became really important to me,” Booker, a Democrat, said as he sat down on a stool to talk about the proposal outside the Senate chamber. “The fact that Senator Lankford, who is a friend and somebody I have a lot of respect and affection for despite partisan disagreements, I just found that partnership supercharged our ability to get it done.”

A Senate version of the bill passed last year, but a similar version in the House did not.

“It’s written very carefully in very close cooperation to make sure there’s no eminent domain for the federal government, there’s no federal takeover, private property rights are all protected,” Lankford said on the Senate floor in May.

A spokesperson for Lankford said the senator “was proud to see bipartisan support — and the strong voices from Greenwood — help push this bill across the finish line. He looks forward to it being signed into law.”

Rep. Tom Cole, also of Oklahoma, seemed open to the idea of the national monument but said he had not yet seen the bill.

Cole said he didn’t think an act like this would face much opposition in the House, and he compared it to the Washita Battlefield National Historic Site, where the U.S. military massacred a Cheyenne village in western Oklahoma in 1868.

“It’s obviously not a happy moment in our history, but it’s very appropriate that it’s a federal monument and it’s got a designation,” Cole said. “I would think the same thing to be true for the Tulsa Race Riot. I know it’s locally well-supported in Tulsa, so I can’t imagine anybody would be opposed to it.”

The site of the Tulsa Race Massacre has received much national attention recently. On Sunday, Tulsa Mayor Monroe Nichols announced a proposed $100-million trust as part of a reparations effort for descendants of those killed in the massacre and its survivors — two of whom are still alive and more than 100 years old.

That comes a few weeks after Democratic Rep. Summer Lee reintroduced a resolution that would recognize that the federal government was responsible for providing reparations to Black Americans; the resolution specifically mentions survivors and descendants of the Tulsa Race Massacre.

And in January, during the final days of the Biden administration, the Department of Justice published the first federal review of the massacre — more than 100 years after the atrocity.

This article first appeared on Oklahoma Watch and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The post Bill to Make the Tulsa Race Massacre Site a National Monument Faces Uncertain Future appeared first on oklahomawatch.org

Oklahoma Watch, at oklahomawatch.org, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that covers public-policy issues facing the state.

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

The article presents a generally factual and balanced overview of the bipartisan legislative effort to designate the Tulsa Race Massacre site as a national monument. It highlights support from both Republican and Democratic senators and representatives while noting some Republican hesitation. The focus on racial justice, historical recognition, and reparations aligns with themes typically emphasized by center-left perspectives. However, the coverage remains largely neutral in tone, reporting on the legislative process, statements from politicians across the aisle, and contextual background without overt editorializing or partisan framing. This suggests a moderate, center-left leaning primarily due to topic emphasis rather than overt bias.

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News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed

Task force team returns to Oklahoma after 16-day mission

Published

17 hours ago

July 23, 2025

Staff Editor

www.youtube.com – KFOR Oklahoma’s News 4 – 2025-07-23 22:52:22

SUMMARY: The first Oklahoma task force team sent to assist Texas after historic, deadly flooding has returned home after a demanding 16-day mission. Led by Battalion Chief Derek Stewart, the team worked tirelessly in the Texas Hill Country, focusing on the hardest-hit areas like Kerrville. Their recovery efforts involved physically exhausting searches along the Guadalupe River, using rafts, canine units, and thorough ground coverage. The experience was mentally draining, with the team facing emotional challenges while bringing closure to affected families. The flooding caused over 100 deaths and catastrophic damage. Stewart emphasized the powerful force of water and expressed gratitude to Texans for their support.

Task force team returns to Oklahoma after 16-day mission

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News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed

Missing, Murdered Native American Cases Delayed as Police Struggle to Work Together

Published

1 day ago

July 23, 2025

Staff Editor

oklahomawatch.org – Elizabeth Caldwell – 2025-07-23 06:00:00

by Elizabeth Caldwell, Oklahoma Watch
July 23, 2025

The most important part of 28-year-old Brandon Hummel’s life was his two children, according to his mother.

“I know in my heart he’s probably not alive anymore because he never would’ve stayed away from those kids this long, or me,” Deana Floyd said.

Floyd left Hummel, a Choctaw citizen, and her other son at home for a trip out of town in January 2024. Hummel stayed in Atoka while his brother reported going to the movies in Ada. When the family returned, Hummel had vanished.

“Yeah, he made mistakes, but through it all, he loved them kids,” Floyd said. “He was just a down-to-earth guy. Even when he got in trouble with the police before, they all liked him. It wasn’t like he was a bad guy or anything, he just had some issues that he got in trouble for.”

Hummel had a track record of leaving home without a lot of communication, so Floyd didn’t contact authorities to report him missing until a month passed. What followed, she said, was a disorganized and lackluster performance from law enforcement resistant to cooperation.

The first organization involved in the search for Hummel was the Atoka County Sheriff. Floyd said the agency initially responded, but passed the case to Choctaw Lighthorse police without further involvement. That was something new, Floyd said, because the sheriff helped the family before.

“When [Brandon] was in his addiction, they didn’t have a problem coming out and arresting him and taking him to jail,” Floyd said. “He was in their jail before.”

Things changed in Oklahoma after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on the McGirt case. That 2020 decision drastically altered the state’s legal landscape, finding much of the eastern portion to be reservation land. As a result, cases that the state would have previously handled were scheduled for tribal or federal courts.

“I think this law that they passed is ridiculous,” Floyd said. “They just want to shove everything over to the [Bureau of Indian Affairs] or the Lighthorse. If they’re Indian, they want nothing to do with it.”

Atoka County Sheriff Kody Simpson was elected last summer, defeating the incumbent after Hummel’s disappearance. Simpson said relations between his office and the Choctaw Nation have improved and it’s no longer policy that cases be sent without follow-up to the tribe.

“I hate to say this, but it’s the truth: in the municipal police and the county sheriff’s offices, it is a way to be lazy,” Simpson said. “It’s absolutely what it boils down to, 100%. They don’t want to deal with the call; they don’t want to deal with any call. The municipalities and the county sheriff’s offices that hand every call off, for tribal citizens, it is a way to be lazy.”

Under the purview of the Lighthorse police, Hummel’s case languished, Floyd said. They weren’t interested in helping because of Hummel’s criminal record. In a written statement, Lighthorse police denied negligence, saying it “investigated and followed local leads diligently for a year before the remaining leads were identified to be individuals located out of the state.”

Lighthorse eventually requested help from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation and the BIA. Floyd said the first BIA agent in charge left without an explanation. His replacement, who is based in Tennessee due to a staff shortage in Oklahoma, has been scarce.

The BIA did not respond to requests for information.

Advocates note similar breakdowns in procedures and relationships. The Northeastern Oklahoma Indigenous Safety & Education advocacy network creates reports for cases it handles. Last year, the group was involved in the search for Trey Glass, a 19-year-old United Keetoowah Band member found dead in a well belonging to a former Kansas, Oklahoma police chief.

In its report on Glass, NOISE noted a tangle of issues, including a delay before tribal authorities were notified of Glass’ disappearance by the family, not the police.

“Much of the confusion could have been delayed, and more resources could have been deployed if the Kansas PD had some foundational knowledge of operating a police department within the exterior boundaries of the Cherokee Nation Reservation,” the NOISE report stated.

The confusion was compounded by an intertribal dispute. Because Glass’ family is UKB, they chose to contact their tribe for help, but the UKB and the Cherokee Nation are at odds over a recent opinion that they legally share the same reservation. The initial search for Glass was a “cluster,” according to the report, as the UKB, the Cherokee Nation and the police tried to sort out who was in charge.

“It should not take 10 hours to issue an AMBER Alert when it meets all the criteria.”

Karissa Newkirk

Chaos, apathy and uncooperative interagency behavior are not uncommon in missing or murdered Native cases such as Hummel’s and Glass’. That’s according to Karrisa Newkirk, president and founder of Missing Murdered Indigenous Women Oklahoma, who said it can be difficult to get law enforcement at any level across the state involved, even in violent emergencies.

“There’s been many domestic violence cases too,” Newkirk said. “So there’s been many times when someone has called because of a domestic violence incident and the city police are like, ‘Oh, you’re tribal? You’re going to have to call tribal police.’ Even though they’re in the city limits. And when you’re in a time of need, that’s not something you want to hear.”

Newkirk, who also collaborates with the Department of Justice, said responses improve if a cross-deputization agreement is in place, but the responsibility for contacting tribal police often still falls on the shoulders of victims, which breeds distrust and confusion.

“I can’t tell you how many times I have been told, ‘Well, they said this, but I was so flustered in the moment, I didn’t do it. I called you,’” Newkirk said.

Newkirk advocates for a range of solutions, including greater resources for the BIA, continued involvement of a responding officer and a standardized approach to police notifying tribes of arrests.

“They probably don’t have a manual, but I really do think there needs to be some kind of workflow,” she said. “Like, ‘Oh, this is a tribal member. How many hours do we have to contact the tribal authority?’”

Newkirk also said agencies that work together should have biweekly check-ins, networking events and annual training.

“A lot of these small PDs don’t even have proper training in human trafficking, or missing children, or even murder cases,” Newkirk said. “It should not take 10 hours to issue an AMBER Alert when it meets all the criteria. Training is a necessity.”

In the meantime, Deana Floyd and other families with missing loved ones wait.

“It’s a nightmare when you don’t know where your child is,” she said. “At this point, I don’t care about anything anymore, except for finding him.”

This article first appeared on Oklahoma Watch and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The post Missing, Murdered Native American Cases Delayed as Police Struggle to Work Together appeared first on oklahomawatch.org

Oklahoma Watch, at oklahomawatch.org, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that covers public-policy issues facing the state.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

This content leans center-left as it highlights systemic issues related to law enforcement’s handling of missing Native American persons, emphasizing problems such as bureaucracy, interagency conflicts, and underfunding that disproportionately affect Indigenous communities. It advocates for increased accountability, better coordination, and expanded resources—positions commonly associated with center-left perspectives that focus on social justice and institutional reform without taking an extreme ideological stance.

News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed

Oklahoman killed in apparent militia attack in Syria

Published

2 days ago

July 22, 2025

Staff Editor

www.youtube.com – KFOR Oklahoma’s News 4 – 2025-07-22 22:21:47

SUMMARY: An Oklahoma man, 35, and a Christian University graduate, was reportedly killed in a militia attack in Syria while visiting his home country. Known as a community member for over a decade, he had earned a master’s degree and was deeply mourned by family and friends, including his father, uncles, brother, and cousin, all victims of violence. Fearful of retaliation, sources shared limited information. Oklahoma Senators James Lankford and Markwayne Mullin expressed heartbreak and are working with regional partners and the governor to gather information. Loved ones emphasize the need for greater attention to overseas conflicts, even affecting distant communities.