We're Hiring: Need Another All-Star Associate

Galanda Broadman, PLLC, an Indian Country Law Firm with eight lawyers and offices in Seattle and Yakima, Washington, and Bend, Oregon, seeks to add an experienced litigation associate to its growing tribal practice in Seattle.

Galanda Broadman is an American Indian owned firm dedicated to advancing tribal and tribal citizen legal rights, and Indian business interests. The firm represents tribal governments, businesses and citizens in critical litigation, business and regulatory matters, especially in the areas of Indian Treaty rights, tribal sovereignty, land rights, cultural property protection, taxation, commerce, gaming, serious/catastrophic personal injury, wrongful death, disenrollment defense, and indigenous human/civil rights.

The firm seeks an associate who is deeply committed to representing Indian interests, who is state bar licensed, preferably in Washington State, and who has at least two to five years of experience in civil litigation or serving as a judicial clerk.

Proven motion and civil rules practice, if not trial experience, and the ability to self-direct are critical. Impeccable writing and research skills; critical and audacious thinking; strong oral advocacy; tremendous work ethic; tenacity; and sound ethics are required.

Salary DOE.

Qualified applicants should submit a cover letter tailored to this announcement, as well as a résumé, writing sample, transcript, and list of at least three educational and professional references, to Alice Hall, the firm’s Office Manager, at alice@galandabroadman.com.

Applications directed elsewhere will not be considered.

Gabe Galanda Named Among America's Best Lawyers for 13th Straight Year

Gabe Galanda has been selected by his peers for inclusion in the 2019 edition of The Best Lawyers in America® in the areas of Gaming Law and Native American Law, for the 13th straight year.  He has now been selected to The Best Lawyers in America® every year since 2007.

Gabe’s practice focuses on complex, multi-party litigation, business controversy, and crisis management, representing tribal governments, businesses and members.

He is skilled at defending tribes and tribal enterprises from legal attacks by local, state and federal government, and representing plaintiffs and defendants in catastrophic injury lawsuits.

Gabe handles Indian civil rights controversies for tribal members, particularly those involving Indian citizenship rights, as well.  He also frequently represents tribal families in federal civil rights litigation against police officers and jailers for the wrongful death of Natives and inmates.

The Best Lawyers in America® is regarded as the definitive guide to legal excellence in the United States. Gabe’s selection was based on a peer-review survey, which all told comprises more than 4.9 million confidential evaluations by top attorneys throughout the country.

Gabriel S. Galanda is the managing lawyer of Galanda Broadman, PLLC, in Seattle. Gabe is a descendant of the Nomlaki and Concow Tribes, belonging to the Round Valley Indian Tribes of Northern California.

Missing the Big Picture: Tribal LLCs and the Moneylending Double Standard

The Lac Vieux Desert Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians was featured in An Unlikely Solution, a film about the online lending industry in Indian Country. Still image from An Unlikely Solution as posted on Indianz.com.

By Anthony Broadman

The Eastern District of Virginia’s decision in Williams v. Big Picture this week is another reminder that Tribal LLCs will be held to a different standard in the lending context. 

Despite a legitimate business entity regulatory framework, the court set aside the Lac Vieux Desert LLC’s sovereign immunity.  Courts are almost uniformly rejecting sovereign immunity for Tribal LLCs in the lending context.  Further, the judicial skepticism found in lending cases is going to bleed into treatment of all Tribal LLCs. 

Doctrinally and technically, Big Picture and the Lac Vieux Desert Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians may have done everything right.  The court recognized legitimate governmental authority to form businesses, regulate those businesses, and return significant, important revenue to the Tribe.  But, reflecting the perceived stink of moneylending, the court rejected the LLC as an arm of the Tribe under the Breakthrough standard. 

Like many multi-part tests applied to Indian economic development, the Breakthrough 6-part test gives courts cover to do whatever they want.  And what the Big Picture court wanted was to ignore sovereign immunity and un-shield a scheme under which non-Tribal stakeholders enjoyed a much stronger position within this particular moneylending operation. 

It’s hard to say whether courts have been so hard on Tribal LLCs in the lending context because courts don’t like moneylending, or because moneylending tribal LLCs have done a poor job of shaping themselves in line with Breakthrough and its progeny. 

Still, the “big picture” should now be clear.  Entities participating in this industry must exceed the standards that we know courts will apply.  And because moneylenders have made the law courts will apply to all Tribal LLCs, non-moneylending LLCs must, too. 

Anthony Broadman is a partner at Galanda Broadman PLLC. He can be reached at 206.321.2672, anthony@galandabroadman.com, or via www.galandabroadman.com.