Heitkamp hears native, oil patch issues
Heitkamp hears native, oil patch issues
By Jerry W. Kram
Heidi Heitkamp, the former North Dakota Attorney General who is running for the United States Senate, apologized for being a few minutes late to a roundtable meeting with supporters in New Town on Monday. She said she was delayed by all the traffic and road construction in the area that made getting to the meeting more complicated.
“Nothing in New Town is as simple as it used to be,” Heitkamp said.
Heitkamp was in New Town to meet with community leaders to talk about some of challenges facing the city and the Fort Berthold Reservation. Among the dozen or so people attending the meeting were representatives from the Fort Berthold Coalition against Domestic Violence, MHA Elders Association and the MHA Energy Department.
Heitkamp quickly outlined her priorities in her Senate campaign, saying it was more important for her to hear from the community. She said her top priority was the battle against domestic violence, especially against Native American women. She said that violence in relationships where one partner is an enrolled member and the other isn’t has been a jurisdictional nightmare that has allowed many victims to slip through the cracks. She said she would propose legislation that would allow tribal courts to have jurisdiction in domestic violence cases when one member of the relationship is an enrolled member.
