photo by: Shawn Valverde

Haskell Indian Nations University is pictured on Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024.

U.S. Sen. Jerry Moran is still working to gain support for legislation that would let Haskell Indian Nations University govern itself, and he says he’s encouraged by the tribes and education groups that have endorsed it so far.

Moran is one of several Kansas Republicans in Congress who helped introduce the Haskell Indian Nations University Improvement Act at the end of June. The bill would transfer the governance of the university from the Bureau of Indian Education, which currently oversees it, to the Haskell Board of Regents.

This week, Moran told the Journal-World in an emailed statement that he had recently spoken with Billy Kirkland, the nominee for assistant secretary for Indian Affairs “who will be tasked with overseeing the university, and we discussed the need to pass this legislation.”

Moran said the recent departure of yet another president of Haskell, Frank Arpan, “underscores the urgent need to enact our legislation reforming the school.” Following Arpan’s resignation earlier this summer, the Bureau of Indian Education named Mackie Moore as interim president of the university.

Moran previously told the Journal-World that Haskell had been “neglected and mismanaged” by the BIE and that the best path forward was for the school to “to be led by an independent Board of Regents … and no longer obstructed by the BIE.”

The other congresspeople who introduced the bill are Sens. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., and Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., and U.S. Reps. Tracey Mann and Derek Schmidt, both Kansas Republicans.

Moran said as he is in the process of gathering additional support for the legislation, he is encouraged by a growing number of tribes urging their representatives in Congress to get behind it. Among them, he said, are four Kansas tribes — the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation, Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska, the Kickapoo Tribe in Kansas and the Sac and Fox Nation of Missouri in Kansas and Nebraska.

The list also includes a number of other tribal nations from outside of Kansas, including the Navajo Nation, the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes, the Modoc Nation and the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians. Other supporters include national Native American groups such as the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, the

Native American Indian Association and the National Congress of American Indians.

While the legislation is working its way through Congress, Haskell itself is bracing for a significant federal funding cut from the Trump administration’s budget reconciliation package, the “One Big Beautiful Bill.” The package is expected to reduce funding to Haskell and other tribal colleges by 90%, and the Haskell Foundation is working to raise $300,000 to support the university through the next school year. More information about that fundraiser can be found at haskellfoundation.org.