February 22, 2001

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Feds misplace Indians’ funds

The records pertaining to billions of dollars of American Indian trust funds are missing, and a court investigator is accusing attorneys from the Departments of Justice and Interior of disrupting his quest to find out why.

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INDIAN COUNTRY TODAY reports that Interior and Treasury Department officials were found in contempt of court after Alan Barlan, the investigator, charged they failed to comply with a court order to produce pertinent documents. Their lawyers claimed the documents were unpresentable, having been inexplicably covered in mouse feces.

The class action lawsuit started in 1996, when Indian plaintiffs sought to force the government to cough up an explanation for $2.4 billion of unreconciled tribal trust funds. General Accounting Office and Interior Department reports also show the federal government has been irresponsible to the beneficiaries of these accounts.

Read the INDIAN COUNTRY TODAY article here.

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From the desk of Mother Jones CEO, Monika Bauerlein...

Newsrooms can be funded in many ways. One of the most controversial (and volatile) ways is by a for-profit corporation or a billionaire owner. We see it across the headlines on a weekly basis: the claw backs in public media, the gutting of The Washington Post, the bending over backwards to appeal to Trump and his allies.

But not here.

When Mother Jones first started publishing 50 years ago, our founders made a critical decision: to be a reader-supported nonprofit. They knew that no corporate owner would be interested in a muckraking newsroom; they also knew that no muckraking newsroom would be interested in following the agenda of a corporate owner.

And so, we’ve been reader-funded for half a century. We rely on contributions from our readers—readers like you—whether it’s $50, or $15 a month, or whatever fits your budget. People give what they can, and every donation makes a difference for our newsroom, which has grown tremendously—in size and reach and renown—since its inception in 1976.

You may be wondering: What does it take to publish an investigation? And what does my donation actually fund? The answers are one and the same: It takes people, resources, and time. And that’s what your donation funds directly.

Every donation Mother Jones receives from readers fortifies our newsroom, whether we’re covering underreported scandals out of Washington, DC, or the most important news of the day. And right now, each donation will be doubled because of our $50,000 match. So when you make a donation—$5, $50, any amount—it’ll go twice as far.

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