Gabriel Pietrorazio

Former North Dakota Republican Gov. Doug Burgum is now officially Interior Secretary, with help from Arizona’s U.S. senators and a couple of its tribes.

This investment from the Powering Affordable Clean Energy Program is supposed to generate more than 30 megawatts of renewable energy for the not-for-profit utility’s roughly 40,000 tribal customers in rural Arizona and New Mexico.

Former North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum testified Thursday before members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, including U.S. Sen. Ruben Gallego. He wanted to know how President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee would help tribes in Arizona if confirmed as the 55th secretary of the Interior.

President-elect Donald Trump and his transition team named outgoing North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum to lead the agency that manages the nation’s natural and cultural resources. He’s set to replace Deb Haaland, the first Native American Interior Department secretary.

The 624,000-acre Chuckwalla National Monument is located just south of Joshua Tree National Park, where the Mojave and Colorado deserts meet. The Fort Yuma Quechan Indian Tribe and Colorado River Indian Tribes maintain ancestral ties to the area.

A bill introduced last year by Congressman Ruben Gallego to help tribes address this pressing issue finally got Senate approval this month and is now headed to President Joe Biden’s desk.

As Congress readies to recess for the holidays, the fate of two Indian water settlements remains uncertain. Although Gov. Katie Hobbs has already signed these agreements on behalf of Arizona last month, they still need to be ratified by federal lawmakers.

Gov. Katie Hobbs announced on Friday that a longstanding tribal land dispute, nearly three decades in the making, is finally getting settled. It’ll transfer thousands of acres of state land into trust for the Hopi Tribe.

Congressman Raúl Grijalva recently helped write a letter signed by nearly three dozen House and Senate Democrats, urging President Joe Biden to pardon an aging Native American rights activist, who was convicted of murdering FBI Agents Jack Coler and Ronald Williams in 1975.

Following last week’s annual conference of Colorado River water users, there’s still unfinished business on Capitol Hill. Three Arizona tribes are hoping Congress will ratify a historic water rights settlement before this session adjourns — otherwise negotiations will have to begin anew.