Los Coyotes Band of Cahuilla & Cupeño Indians v. Jewell

I.

The Secretary of the Interior appeals the district court’s decision granting summary judgment in favor of the Los Coyotes Band of Cahuilla and Cupeño Indians (the “Tribe”). The district court found that the Secretary violated the Indian Self Determination and Education Assistance Act (“ISDA”), the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”), and the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection when the Secretary declined to enter into a self-determination contract with the Tribe to fund law enforcement on the Los Coyotes Reservation.

We conclude that the Secretary properly rejected the Tribe’s contract request. The Tribe's reliance on the ISDA is misplaced. The ISDA allows the Tribe to take control of existing programs and obtain the funds that the Bureau of Indian Affairs (“BIA”) would otherwise have spent on those programs. Where there is no existing BIA program, there is nothing that the BIA would have spent on the program, and therefore nothing to transfer to the Tribe. That there is no existing BIA law enforcement program on the Los Coyotes Reservation is a result of the agency’s decision to allocate resources elsewhere. The allocation of those resources is an…